Just Like Old Times
by That'sNotMe
Summary: Post ME3: Shepard breaks the Reapers' indoctrination, and makes it back to Garrus alive. But what is in store for two heroes who are not content to stop the fight for justice? M for language and occasional interspecies "relations."
1. Forgive the Insubordination

**Chapter 1: "Forgive the insubordination"**

**Shepard**

She took a deep breath – and instantly regretted it. The air was filled with ash and smoke – it burned. Everything hurt.

The rubble held her claustrophobically – trapped against the ground. Shepard tried pushing it aside. Pain shot down her arms and she cried out reflexively. Another breath – not so deep this time.

"_Come back alive."_

She gathered her strength. She could barely recall the last hour – or had it been longer? Her time inside the Citadel was hazy – split between reality and dream state. Her return to earth had been even worse. Despite the pyrotechnics in the sky, the warped, disfigured minions of the Reapers remained on earth. Their masters were gone – just like that – but like vicious animals, they continued to fight. All she remembered was coming out of the beam into the path of a brute. And that headache… perhaps she would lie here a moment longer.

"_It'd be an awfully empty galaxy without you."_

The flanged voice ran through her memory. It was different from the voices that had been in her head before. This one was real. Concrete. Harshness and desperation tinged the edges.

_Garrus._

She felt the same desperation rising up in her gut. Where was he? When she last caught sight of him, he was behind her, visor aligned with his scope. In his element. But that was a long time ago. Or at least it felt that way.

She managed to pry the largest chunk of London's rubble from atop her and pull herself out, biting her cheek at the pain. But she breathed in the free-flowing air – the pain dissipating for a moment in the starlight.

The chorus of gunfire, shouts, and agonized groans came from all around her. The path to the Citadel beam – the concave valley she found herself in – was empty, aside from the dead. She dimly remembered someone – Anderson? That couldn't be right. No, it was major Coats – calling for a retreat over the comms.

"_Did we get anyone to the beam?"_

"_Negative. Our entire force was decimated."_

The panic rose up in her again. Her team. She had brought Vega and Ashley with her – the two were like tanks pushing against the Reaper beams. She had left the rest behind – battling in the mazes of London's destroyed streets – to keep the husks focused on them until the Reapers could be brought down.

"Vega?" She called, but no sound emerged from her dry throat. She coughed – another deep, painful breath.

"Vega! Williams!" She shouted, this time her voice carrying, echoing through the valley.

An explosion in the sky above her rocked the rubble and made her stumble. The Crucible had spotted another Reaper – there were few left now – and disintegrated it with one fiery beam. She balled her right hand into a fist, willing them to continue, sending her strength to them. It was a grim victory, but victory nonetheless.

She continued through the rubble – through the bodies.

"Vega!" She shouted again. "Williams!"

No response. _God damn it. _She couldn't let that fear that was settling in her gut make it to her mind, not yet. Not to mention the pang in her heart when she wondered whom they might have lost in the city above her.

She stumbled over an assault rifle in her path. A Valkyrie, well-loved and battle-worn. A classic – Ashley always insisted on the good old-fashioned N7 issues. Shepard felt that cold pit in her stomach grow as she turned the rifle over in her hands.

There it was. A tiny engraving.

_One equal temper of heroic hearts,_

_Made weak by time and fate, but strong in will_

_To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield._

Tennyson. Shepard tore through the rubble, the ache in every bone of her body ignored. Until she felt it. Soft flesh, cold and slick with blood. She pushed the rubble aside. Ashley lay silent, her torso cleaved by a Reaper laser, her armor ripped apart like it had been fragile silk.

Sense returned to Shepard's clouded mind after a moment. She crossed Ashley's arms gently over her chest, and picked up the rifle.

_Perhaps this will help give Sarah some closure_, she thought wearily.

She stood, her pessimism sealed. She no longer feared the worst – her conscious mind was fighting to accept the truth. The assault on the Collector base was supposed to be a suicide mission, but she had always known that this confrontation would make their fear of the Collector base feel laughable.

"_You're a survivor, Ash. Always were."_

"_I hope you're right."_

"Goodbye, Ash," Shepard said, more to herself than anything. "Thank you."

She began to trudge back up that hill, the aches in her body making themselves heard. She grabbed at her side as a sharp pain tweaked, and felt the sticky, hot blood that was beginning to congeal.

There – suddenly! – something stirred under some rubble. A meaty hand – a behemoth of a man – pushed its way out from some rubble.

"Vega!"

Shepard ran to the pile, pulling the rubble aside as quickly as she could with a gentle hand. There was no telling the injuries he had suffered. She dug him out, his eyes barely open, his head lolling back like a baby's.

"Hey Lola," he grunted.

"Vega, you okay?" She leaned over him, checking his wounds carefully. He'd lost a lot of blood, but she didn't think it was fatal.

"Could be worse," he coughed. Then he looked up at her chest pointedly. "At least I gotta great view."

There was that twinkle in his eye. Shepard couldn't help but smile.

"Glad your morale hasn't suffered, Vega. Can you stand?"

She helped him up, and his eyes nearly rolled back in his head. He stumbled, and as strong a woman as she was, he easily had 100 pounds on her. It was all she could do to keep him from tumbling to the ground.

"Whoa, easy, soldier," she chided. "One step at a time."

She activated her comm link and spoke into it. "This is Commander Shepard. We need medical personnel at the beam. We got one injured survivor, maybe more."

There was a long pause, and the voice at the other end was incredulous: "Commander Shepard?"

"You heard right, Coats," Shepard replied. "Now get me a medical team."

She shifted Vega's weight to support him better.

"You ready to meet them halfway?"

"You bet, Commander," he grunted.

She half carried the hulking marine up the hill. The shouts of the medical team grew louder as they grew closer. She could hear the sounds of battle growing dimmer – receding. Suddenly, she felt heavy, cold. She began to shiver.

Barely conscious, Vega muttered: "You alright there, Lola?"

"Yeah," she gritted her teeth through the words. "I died once already, remember? This is nothing."

His laugh was more a groan, but it was good to hear. The medical team encircled them, pulled Vega from her to treat his wounds.

Shepard plodded on – she heard the voices of the team speaking to her receding back dimly, as if in a dream:

"Commander, we should take a look at you, too."

"I need to get back to the base."

Did she say that out loud? She thought she did, but wasn't sure her mouth had cooperated. She kept on forward. Her mind began to blur again, but this was different. Not like on the Citadel – it was memories that threatened to block out reality this time.

_She had stretched upwards, lifting herself onto her toes to touch her lips to his face. His arms had tightened around her waist, pulling her close. Reluctant when she finally pulled away._

"_Goodbye, Garrus. And if I'm up there in that bar and you're not, I'll be looking down. You'll never be alone."_

She hadn't expected to survive. She had feared for his loneliness, in the inevitable event that her life was the sacrifice she had to make for the galaxy. For the first time, Shepard realized that she might be the one who was left alone. Her head throbbed, and the world in front of her swirled. She had lost a lot of blood.

There was a glint in a tower up ahead – she looked up. Light from a nearby explosion glanced off of blue armor. Then a whistle, and a concussive round hit – a few feet to her left.

She looked up, her mouth hanging open in a silent pant. _Was that…?_

And then she felt that slow ebbing of blood in her temples subside. The world around her spun faster, darkened to red. And then silence engulfed her.

**Coats**

When Shepard had called over the comm for a medical team, Coats had barely believed his ears. He knew someone had made it to the Citadel – the Crucible had been activated and begun to decimate the Reapers – but Shepard and Anderson had both fallen silent long before that. They had both been assumed dead. And then, to hear that voice, ringing with conviction, over the comm…

_Well,_ he chuckled to himself, _perhaps the stories are true. If this woman has already returned from beyond the grave once, who's to say she can't do it again?_

He watched the hubbub below from his perch inside Big Ben. For any young British boy in another time, this would be a dream come true. Sat atop one of the most famous structures, one that had been closed to the public for generations, clutching a sniper rifle. But watching London smolder below, it was more of a nightmare.

A deep sigh loosed from his chest. Weary. He looked through his scope again, taking out a marauder from afar. The victory of watching those metallic monsters explode in the sky was soon crushed by the heaviness of weeks of battle. The fight wasn't over yet.

And they had lost so many.

**Shepard**

Darkness enveloped her. Voices ran together in her head. Chatter and static, like a disrupted comm link. It made her head ache. She tried to stir, and the voices picked up. She fought against the darkness – everything hurt – but she couldn't stay there anymore. She needed light, needed to find the source of the voices.

Her eyes opened.

The figures surrounding her blurred together, their voices still indistinguishable.

She blinked – the fuzzy glare of lights began to sharpen, solidifying the figures. A salarian in doctor's clothing. He was talking to her. She blinked again.

"…slowly, Commander," he was saying.

Another doctor, this one a human, leaned into her field of vision. He said something to her – the words echoed, but did not register.

She blinked again – more murmuring. A fuzzy blue figure cleared up into –

"Liara," she murmured.

Liara's smiling eyes brightened at her, and she took Shepard's hand in both of hers, squeezing gently.

"Shepard, it's good to see you."

Shepard smiled. She tried to sit up, and everything went nearly black again. The voices blurred.

"…transfusion… rest necessary."

"…okay? I am happy to…."

That must have been Liara – the sweetness in the voice came through.

Her dizziness grew, and the voices started to meld together again.

She felt her hand slip out of Liara's grip.

She closed her eyes again. The blurry faces were making her dizzy. The darkness was preferred – she felt less like she was going to expel what she was certain were the meager contents of her stomach.

Then the murmuring began to clear. She felt cool air move across her chest and knew the crowd was clearing away.

Fear started to rise in her again. What if it wasn't over? Where were they going – was the attack still going on? New patients coming in, needing their attention. But a small, selfish part of her didn't want them to leave…

She forced her eyes to open again. One figure over her now – her blurred vision could only make out a vaguely gray blob with a blue circle seemingly attached to it. She felt someone take her hand again – a warm hand, much warmer than a human hand, with three long, slender, curved talons. And that unmistakable voice spoke softly, saying her name quietly, as if it were a treasure, a secret for just the two of them:

"Shepard."

Her vision cooperated once again – the silvery blur focused itself into a smooth face: the elegant fringe, the rounded carapace, the faint scarring on the right mandible and cheek, and those fierce blue eyes.

Liara was supporting him; he leaned heavily on her, one arm slung over her shoulder, white bandages wrapped tightly over the smooth plating of his opposite shoulder. Blue blood seeped through the bandage. She took this all in – her eyes memorizing every detail of him.

"Garrus."

It was barely even a breath, but she knew from the way his mandibles twitched that he'd heard it. His hand closed tightly around hers.

He slowly eased out of Liara's supporting grip, resting his weight against the hospital bed. He reached his injured arm towards her face, lightly brushing her hair from her forehead. If she hadn't known him so well and become so well-versed in the subtleties of turian expressions, she wouldn't have noticed him suppress a wince at the movement in his shoulder.

"Not bad for my first order, hmm?" He spoke so softly, for her ears only. "Maybe I have leadership potential after all."

The lightness of the joke was betrayed by the depth of feeling in his voice. She felt herself falling away again, despite her struggle to stay there – stay coherent.

"Garrus…" she started to say, feeling the blackness creep in at the edge of her vision.

He shushed her gently, squeezing her hand again.

"Just rest," he said. His voice was echoing now as she felt herself slip away. "I'll be here when you wake up."

**Garrus**

Garrus held her hand in his long after she had slipped back to unconsciousness. Behind him, he could hear Liara fussing about, communicating with the doctors and coordinating triage. She was doing what she could – what she did best. She had avoided injury in the battle on Earth and was working double to make up for it. She paused for a moment and he felt her cool hand on his shoulder.

"Garrus," she said in her soft voice, "you should rest, too."

"I'll be okay, Liara," he said, although he felt every bone in his body on fire.

He didn't look back at her, but could feel the apprehension in her gaze. He knew she didn't believe him, but she stepped away respectfully. She would be back, and that was fine. For now, he just needed to stay here.

He had seen her coming up that hill. Hobbling, barely held together. At first he had been astonished. When Harbinger had arrived, he had feared the worst. When the crucible had begun firing what felt like an eternity later, he had cheered with the rest of them. But then there had been nothing from her. They had called her name over the comm. He heard Hackett asking her to come in. Nothing.

_Anger rose up in him. He had heard human soldiers speak of suppressing their feelings of grief on the battlefield, but such a concept was foreign to a turian. This anger, this grief-anger, propelled him forward through the crowds of brutes, banshees, and other terrible, disfigured beasts. It was the same anger that propelled him back on Omega, after he had lost his team; when he had been known as Archangel._

_Fierce, calculated, intense. He couldn't see the intimidating impression he projected, but he felt it all in his bones. Assault rifle out, he sent cascades of bullets ripping through the chalky grey hides. When he ran low on ammo, he vaulted over a wall and scrambled up the stairs to a tower, where he brought out his sniper rifle and took aim._

_It seemed like ages he was perched there, watching for targets, taking them down. And then he saw her crest the hill, her armor glinting. How he knew it was her, he wasn't certain. It could be any woman in armor. But something in the way she walked, through the limp, through the obvious pain she was in. He just knew. _

Liara's gentle hand on his arm pulled him from the reverie.

"I've brought a chair over for you," Liara told him. "You should rest, but I knew better than to think you will return to your room."

She helped him take a seat as he chuckled.

"Yes, mom," he teased her.

"She'll be alright, Garrus," Liara soothed as she left the room.

He simply nodded, taking Shepard's hand in his again.


	2. No Rest for the Wicked

**Chapter 2: "No Rest for the Wicked"**

**Shepard**

When Shepard awoke again, she took a deep breath. There was still pain, but it felt dull and muted. The medigel was working, and it seemed the painkillers were, too. Slowly, she rolled herself on her right side to work her way to a seated position. The room was quiet – it seemed empty.

She finished pulling herself up, and heard a stirring beside her. The room wasn't empty. Garrus blinked, his eyes sleepy, and when he saw her sitting up, he sat forward eagerly in his seat, taking hold of her hands.

"How long was I out?" she asked, groggily.

"Couple of days," he said.

"Damn," she said softly. "Those reapers pack a hell of a punch, don't they?"

He laughed, softly. She looked him in the eyes.

"Thank you," he murmured. There was tenderness in his voice, and his talons softly stroked the back of her hands.

"For what?"

He held eye contact, but tipped his head down slightly.

"For everything. But mostly, for coming back to me in one piece."

She tilted her head forward, bringing their foreheads to touch lightly.

The door opened behind Garrus and Major Coats walked in. Garrus pulled away, sitting back in his chair.

Coats stood at attention.

"Commander Shepard."

She nodded, "Coats."

"Glad to see you up. Admiral Hackett wanted to speak with you over vidcom as soon as you were awake."

She heard Garrus growl softly, a frustrated sound deep in his chest.

"Understood, Coats. Tell the admiral I will be right there."

Coats saluted, Shepard returned the favor, and then he spun on his heel and left.

She locked eyes with Garrus again.

"No rest for the wicked," she smiled.

"You're hardly wicked," he replied.

She grinned, her eyes twinkling.

"Oh?" she asked, innocently.

She loved the mixture of surprise and anticipation she got in response, and the way his eyes turned hot and heavy on her and he laughed, deep in his chest.

"Maybe I was wrong," he said in a low voice.

She started to edge off the bed and he helped her, the flimsy hospital gown flapping.

"Now, let's see if they left me a spare uniform."

**Garrus**

Garrus helped her dress in a new, clean Alliance uniform. She had grimaced as he helped her slide the sleeves up a bandaged arm, and he had tried to keep from touching the wounds on her side.

"How do I look?" she'd asked him grimly when they'd finished.

"Like the savior of the galaxy," he had told her proudly, glad to see a smile creep across her face.

She had picked up a datapad to read the briefing. She was about to give her own briefing about what had happened on the Citadel, but had not yet been updated about what happened to the ground team. She sighed heavily reading the list of those lost. From their own team they had lost Ashley, and Tali was battling a severe infection from a suit puncture and numerous shrapnel wounds. The list of losses from other teams was heavy. Garrus knew – he had helped compile the briefing for Shepard for when she woke.

He had walked her to the command center at the forward operating base. When she shut the door behind her, he stood there for a moment.

It was quiet around the base, compared with the last few days. He felt antsy all of a sudden, without a gun in his hand or an enemy to line up in the scope of his sniper rifle.

"General Vakarian."

The voice of Primarch Victus behind him made him jump. He bowed his head slightly in deference.

"Primarch."

"Who would have thought we'd ever see an alliance like this one?" the primarch asked him, tilting his head to the side.

"I wouldn't have believed it from anyone but Commander Shepard, sir," Garrus responded. "The past three years have seen wonders the galaxy has never known before."

"That's for sure," the primarch said.

He paused, observing Garrus carefully. _Measuring _him.

"Vakarian," he said. "After all this is over, there will be a lot of movement back on Palaven. We lost a lot of people in this fight."

Garrus nodded, exchanging a silent glance of understanding with the primarch. Garrus's father and sister had made it safely off the homeworld, but many others, including the primarch, were not so lucky.

"We could use you, Vakarian," he continued. "It'll be a new galactic world, and I could use someone with your breadth, your understanding of this uneasy peace that Commander Shepard has brokered. The council was lost when the Reapers took the Citadel, as I'm sure you were already aware."

"I had assumed as much," Garrus said grimly.

"I would be honored if you would serve as our representative," the Primarch said.

Garrus felt his eyes widen. He gaped. _Surely, he must be joking. Of all the turians to appoint to the council, he chooses the one who abandoned his duties at C-Sec to become a vigilante killer on the most lawless hive of vermin in the galaxy._

But the longer Garrus remained speechless, the longer the primarch considered him calmly. And Garrus realized…

"You're serious?"

Victus nodded.

"You've shown astounding commitment to justice and truth, though your methods are a bit unorthodox," he paused, and Garrus thought he saw a twinkle in those eyes. "Then again, for a turian, I have somewhat of an unusual perspective on heterodoxy."

Garrus stood straighter, but bowed his head at the neck again in a sign of respect.

"I am honored, primarch." He paused, hesitating before continuing, "but I need some time to consider. This is not a decision to make lightly."

The primarch nodded.

"I expect to hear from you soon, general."

"Of course, Primarch Victus."

With one last appraising look, the Primarch turned and left. Garrus felt he might be floating in a haze of confusion, but his feet remained firmly planted on the floor.

**Shepard**

"Commander Shepard."

The hologram of Admiral Hackett flickered in front of her.

"Admiral," she replied, saluting him.

He returned the gesture, a look of amazement on his face.

"I hate to sound so grim, but I have to admit I'm a little surprised to see you."

_...Alive?_ she finished for him silently.

She chuckled a little, "I'm a bit surprised myself, sir."

"What happened up there, Commander? You went dark for hours."

She shifted uncomfortably, feeling the stitches in her side stretch painfully.

"Sir, I'm not entirely sure," she began. "It was unlike anything I've experienced before. The closest I can remember is when I accessed the Prothean Beacon back on Eden Prime."

A beat. She tried to gather the words to explain, but couldn't.

"I don't think you'd believe me if I tried to explain what happened up there," she finished. "I'm just glad the Crucible worked."

"It would have meant nothing if you hadn't gotten the Citadel arms open. The Reapers are retreating – we're pursuing them into the Skyllian Verge with the Crucible. From what we can tell, there aren't many of them left."

Shepard nodded. "Glad to hear it, sir."

"Commander, we couldn't have done this without you. You and your team did good work. You should be proud."

"Yes, sir. I am."

"Now, there is some business to discuss."

She straightened, keeping her hands clasped behind her back, her legs in the wide stance that felt to her like power and readiness.

"I want you to report to the Citadel as soon as we have returned it to the Serpent Nebula," the admiral continued. "There is still work to be done. We lost the Council when the Reapers took the Citadel, and we will have to select a new representative for humanity. Your input will no doubt be influential. You're still a Spectre, and I imagine the new Council will have more than enough work to keep you busy. The Reapers left a mess, and while the alliance you forged is…" he paused, a small smile growing on his face, "_something else,_ I for one am not sure how it will hold up, now that the threat of the Reapers is gone."

Shepard nodded: "Understood, sir. It's a hell of a job getting people to cooperate, even with galactic destruction as the motivator."

Admiral Hackett nodded, smiling knowingly.

"Damn right," he said. "I don't envy you your position. But I know that you can get the job done. You always have, Shepard."

There it was – the small feeling of pride that was starting to grow inside her had been conspicuously missing since the Crucible started its assault on the Reapers. She knew, in her head, that what they had accomplished was like nothing else that had ever been done before. But against the backdrop of loss – Ashely, Tali fighting for her life, Vega facing injuries worse than he'd ever endured – it hadn't felt like enough.

And now… it was beginning to. She felt the corners of her lips turn upwards ever so slightly. _We did it. We sent those Reapers back where they came from._

"Thank you, sir," she said, bowing her head slightly.

"One last thing, Commander," the admiral said.

"Sir?"

"There will be a ceremony on the Citadel, after a new Council is selected and some clean up is done. Make sure you've got your dress uniform starched."

"A ceremony, sir?"

"You're the savior of the galaxy, Shepard. The third time over, no less. It's time you got your moment."

"That's not necessary, sir," she said, somewhat hastily. "I – I don't need a ceremony to know I did my job."

He chuckled at that.

"I know, Commander. You're a soldier through and through. You may not need this ceremony, but trust me," he nodded to her, pride shining in his eyes, "the galaxy _does._ And you've earned it, Shepard. Enjoy it. Hackett out."

The hologram flickered, and vanished.

As Shepard left the briefing room, she saw Garrus waiting up ahead in the hallway. He fell into step with her as she continued down the hall.

"How'd it go?" he asked her.

"Fine. Hackett wants me to meet him at the Citadel as soon as they return it to the Serpent Nebula. Something about 'continued work.'"

"What, they're not letting you retire just yet?" Humor tinged his voice.

She sighed – more heavily than she'd intended to. "Not yet."

They walked in silence a few moments more, before she spoke again.

"To be honest, I don't know what I'd do with myself. As much as I would like a break, I remember my six months grounded on Earth. I nearly drove myself up a wall."

He chuckled softly, a low, quiet sound: "No rest for the wicked."

She stopped, suddenly, and he also froze, turning to face her, a quizzical look on his face.

"What is it?" he asked, concerned.

"I just," she paused, uncertain how to explain it. "I had the strangest…" _was it a dream? _"…vision, I guess, on the Citadel. I don't know what it was, but Harbinger was… messing with my mind. Trying to turn me into the Illusive Man."

"Indoctrination?" His voice was incredulous, almost awed. "Clearly, Harbinger didn't know what mind he was getting himself into."

Shepard smiled at the affection in his words.

"Well, he tried, anyhow," she said. "He showed me some bullshit choices, and I saw… the future. Or what he wanted me to think the future would be. The mass relays – all of them – exploded, and the _Normandy_ escaped ahead of the blast. It crashed on some… tropical planet. And I saw you… you got off the _Normandy, _and you looked up. It was like you were looking right at me, from another star system."

She looked at him – he was giving her a very different look now. Fearful, concerned, and a little sad.

"That's when I… woke up," she said. "I knew what I had to do. I was there to destroy the Reapers. We deserve a chance. All of us."

He had moved closer to her as she told her story, and now their chests were nearly touching. His three-fingered hands rested gently in the crooks of her elbows.

"But seeing you _alive, well_, in that vision…" she drifted off. "At that point, I didn't know what happened to any of you, except that Harbinger decimated everything around me before I made it up that beam."

She reached up and gently touched the bandage on his shoulder. He winced slightly and took her hand in his own.

"I did tell you I could go out and get some new scars to drive you wild all over again, didn't I?" His mandibles flared, expressing the wry humor apparent in his voice.

For some reason, those were the words that did it. They let loose the fear that had been growing inside her as she'd walked along the edge of despair. To come so far – to win such a mighty victory, only to lose the chance to hear that firm, expressive voice again – it would have been unthinkable.

She was embarrassed to realize that tears were slipping out of her eyes, dissolving the thick, painful lump that had been in her throat. She turned away, into a dark corner, to escape the prying eyes of the soldiers walking the halls around her. After all this, to break down… they saw her as strong: a hero. And here she was crying like a schoolgirl.

She heard Garrus's soft footfall behind her; knew he'd followed her. He waited, tentative. After a moment, he reached a hand out, brushing her shoulder.

"Shepard," he started, his voice gentle, timid even. "I didn't mean to say the wrong thing… I didn't…"

He broke off, uncertain. He started to pull his hand away, but she turned to face him, pulling him into the shadows with her.

"No, Garrus," she whispered, her attempts to staunch the flow of tears useless. "You didn't say anything wrong."

He watched her, his mouth slightly open in bemusement, concern. His pale blue eyes flickered between hers and the tears that ran down her cheeks, dripped from her lips in silence. She realized that despite all the vulnerable moments they had spent together, despite all the walls she had dropped to let him in, he had never seen her cry.

"Shepard," he said again, his voice dropping to nearly a whisper.

He reached out, touching one of his talons to her temple ever so gently. He traced it lightly down her face, catching a tear in its tracks. His blue eyes wavered, fearful.

Slowly, he lowered his face down towards her, touching their foreheads together, squeezing her shoulders lightly with his gloved hands. Shepard closed her eyes, felt the tears start to shake her body, her chest aching as she tried to suppress it – to keep the rhythm of her breath steady. He must have felt the way her shoulders trembled, because he pulled back, squaring himself in front of her.

"There, there," he said softly.

"I couldn't bear to lose you, Garrus," Shepard managed between the hiccupping sobs she was still holding in. "After everything."

She reached out and ran her fingers gently over the scars on his face, remembering how she had almost lost him once before. She realized how similar her fear had been then to the deep pit that was tearing at her insides after the battle. She hadn't known on that fateful day on Omega, but that was the start of it. When she had begun to understand just how much he really meant to her. Her most trusted friend; her most loyal squadmate who always had her back; the only one who knew how to push her buttons and make her laugh at the same time; but more than any of that, the one whose soul mirrored her own. Like binary stars, they held each other together, kept each other on their path. Connected.

"We're a team," he said, his eyes twinkling at her as he echoed her own words back. "There's no Vakarian without Shepard. And hey, I think I'm starting to get the hang of this 'ducking' thing."

She laughed at that, her laughter mixing with the sobs. He frowned, a puzzled look on her face. She laughed harder at the expression.

"I'm sorry, Garrus," she said between gasping breaths. "Human emotions…" she let her words drift off, "well, they're a little complicated."

With one swift move, he grabbed her by the waist and pulled her to him, taking away what little breath she had left. He held her gaze with a strength in his blue eyes, and said in a voice heavy with love:

"That's okay. I'm just glad that I have plenty of time to learn all about them now."

She couldn't help herself. She kissed him roughly. She might never get used to the feeling of his smooth, hard lip-plates, so unlike a human kiss, but the passion in his grip on her waist, his heavy breath against her face, and the way his tongue explored her mouth was enough to bring fire to her stomach.

She felt him pull away reluctantly, and she realized that the wound on her side was throbbing: a deep, painful ache. She winced.

"We're quite a pair," Garrus mused.

"Yeah, we are," Shepard replied. "I wouldn't have it any other way."

She kissed a mandible lightly, enjoying the soft, contented purring sound that he made, and then she pulled back.

"It's you and me, big guy. To the end."

"I like the way that sounds."


	3. There's Nowhere I'd Rather Be

_Quick note: Jack is joining the regular cast of this little show, so the rating is going to get bumped up to M. That lady has a mouth on her…_

**Chapter 3: "There's Nowhere I'd Rather Be"**_  
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**Liara**

She scanned the contents of her datapad quickly, but thoroughly, trying to quell the frantic feeling inside her. This felt uncomfortably like Thessia. Seeing her home decimated and walking away with barely a scratch. There was so much to be done… so much sacrifice to make the galaxy right again. And she kept getting away unharmed. There _must _be more she could do.

She glanced up at the suited form in the hospital bed. Since Shepard had stabilized, she had spent most of her time here, hoping that her presence could be of help to Tali. Even if she was just working, gathering Shadow Broker resources, in a stiff chair next to the bed.

Tali had not stirred for hours. They had her dosed with very strong sedatives so her weak immune system could work without distractions inside her new, sterilized suit. While quarians at home on Rannoch were already beginning to remove their masks and breath their native air, Tali had left too early for the geth to implement their immune-strengthening programs in her suit.

The sound of polished metal sliding smoothly aside drew her attention. She glanced over her shoulder to see Shepard stride into the room. She smiled to see the power back in the woman's step. Garrus followed her in.

"Shepard," Liara said, rising from her chair and throwing her arms around the commander, her friend.

"Liara," Shepard said, holding her tightly in a hug. "We did it."

Liara released Shepard and smiled up at her.

"Yes we did, Shepard."

The commander turned her attention to Tali now.

"How is she?"

"Not good, I'm afraid. She got caught between a banshee and a group of cannibals. The banshee took down her shields, and in the firefight her suit was punctured pretty badly. Ripped is more accurate. She only made it this far because Garrus took them all down when he saw what was happening."

Liara smiled up at Garrus now, laying a calming hand on his arm.

"I wasn't fast enough," he growled.

Liara could see the worry in his eyes. They had been together the longest, Tali and Garrus. Part of Shepard's team from the start, along with her. They had been with Shepard when she went through the Omega 4 relay, when Liara had been tied up dealing with the Shadow Broker.

"You did what you could, Garrus," Liara soothed.

Shepard reached out cautiously, but stopped her hand just before taking Tali's gloved fingers in her own.

"It's okay, Shepard. She's in a new airtight suit. It's a sterile environment inside, and it's strong. You don't have to worry," Liara reassured her.

Shepard brought Tali's hand between her own two, squeezing gently.

"She has a terrible infection," Liara explained. "They're giving her antibiotics intravenously and keeping her asleep so her body can fight it. We should know in a day or two if she's going to come out of it."

"Thanks for watching over her, Liara."

Shepard met Liara's eyes with her own. Liara could feel the closeness in the room. Four old friends. Silence was often enough between the four of them. After years of countless battles, struggles, and shared experiences, they were connected.

"Of course," Liara replied softly. "There's nowhere else I'd rather be."

It was true.

Shepard sighed, squeezing Tali's hand again.

"Hang in there, Tali," she said softly.

There was a quiet moment, then, as everyone silently urged their small quarian friend to use her feisty courage and break through this fight and come out stronger for it. Garrus gently wrapped an arm around Shepard's waist and Liara rested her head on her shoulder.

Shepard took a deep breath.

"We were going to head back to the Normandy. We'll stay in orbit for a few days, until the Citadel is back in place. Then, duty calls," Shepard smiled when she said this, but there was a grimness to the smile.

Liara nodded.

"I will remain with Tali until the Normandy departs. She's in good hands with these doctors, and they will keep us apprised of her condition."

She typed into her datapad, but it was redundant: she had already added the Shadow Broker's eyes to every update sent from this hospital.

"Great," Shepard said.

Her eyes lingered over Tali for a long moment, and Liara could read the worry in the way her eyelashes fluttered and the way her fists clenched. She glanced over at Garrus and knew he was reading the same signs. The two of them had always had Shepard's back. Liara had suspected for some time that Garrus's attachment was more than commitment to duty and had been glad to hear that the two had become an item before their journey through the Omega 4 relay.

_There is just something about the way they've always worked together,_ she mused to herself. _Synchronicity. Two halves coming together as one whole._

She knew the soft smile was still on her face when Shepard turned back to her.

"Okay," she said. "We'll be aboard the Normandy if you need us. Contact us the second – "

Liara interrupted gently, "Of course, Shepard. You will know the instant I do."

**Shepard**

As she and Garrus approached the makeshift shuttle bay, Shepard heard shouting from ahead. She cast a concerned glance towards Garrus, who returned it. They both picked up their pace.

Sure enough, in front of the Normandy's Kodiak shuttle, a full-blown brawl was brewing. And Shepard knew from the moment she saw the leather jacket, the small dark ponytail over a shaved and tattooed scalp, and the wide stance the cargo-pant clad legs were in that the trouble could spark into a full-blown blaze at any moment.

"Jack!" Shepard shouted.

The fierce young woman snapped her attention away from Cortez – who had been holding his ground firmly – and sprang at Shepard. Shepard steeled herself, expecting another punch to the face and ready to block it, but instead Jack stopped short, fists at her side.

"Shepard," she said, her voice strangely tremulous. Then, she stiffened, and the sting came back into her voice.

"_Fuck _you, Shepard!" She screamed. "I thought you'd died up there! What the _fuck_ happened?"

Shepard held her hands out in a peaceable gesture.

"It's okay, Jack. It's – complicated. I was injured on my way back."

"She was unconscious for three days," Garrus growled, his protective instincts clearly roused by Jack's temper.

Shepard shot him a look that meant: _I've got this._ He backed down, but the twitch in the muscle in his neck told her he was far from relaxed.

"What, were you worried about me Jack?" She teased, walking the line carefully. Jack could still be like an animal at times: rabid, desperate, and dangerous.

"Worried about my own ass, more like it," Jack retorted. "And my kids. Those fucking reapers were about to roll over those marines and then _my kids_ would have been in the line of fire. Could you have cut it a little closer?"

Shepard smiled. There was venom in Jack's words, but she could hear the emotion, too. Before this, Jack killed because it fed a deep need for control, for vengeance. Now, she killed to _protect._

"Wow, Jack. You've gotten downright _maternal._"

"Shut it, Shepard. Now will you tell this dipshit to let me on the _Normandy?"_

Jack gestured rudely towards Cortez, who shrugged. His blue eyes seemed to say _just doing my job._

Shepard smiled, "You coming with us, Jack?"

"Alliance is setting us up with a new training school. They're gonna build something out in the middle of fucking nowhere, just how I like it, but for now they're setting us up on the Citadel. Whenever it comes back from blowing the reapers to shit. Said we could catch a ride on the _Normandy. _ You mind?"

"Not at all," Shepard said, nodding to Cortez. "Add Jack here to the shuttle manifest, and any of her kids from the Grissom Academy. You should be able to get a full list from Alliance brass."

"You got it, Commander," Cortez said, and settled into the pilot seat of the shuttle as Shepard, Garrus, and Jack clambered aboard.

He pressed a button and the shuttle doors slid shut. With the rumble of the engines spreading soothingly from her feet up her body, she smiled over at Jack. Was it just her, or was that scowl a little more contented than she'd seen it before? Shepard nuzzled herself into the cavity where the armor of Garrus's chestpiece met his narrow waist, ignoring Jack's eye-rolling.

_We're going home,_ she thought, and from the contented sigh that came from Garrus and the way his eyes softened and blinked languidly, she knew he felt the same.

**Garrus**

When the shuttle had docked aboard the Normandy, Shepard had gone to check on Joker, EDI, the good doctor Chakwas, and the crew. As Shepard's laughter rang out from the cockpit, along with Joker's exuberant voice and EDI's calm and clear phrasing, he had retreated to the forward battery, letting her do her job as she always had. That was her place, not his.

He let his talons run along the smooth surface of the control panel. The quiet humming of the ship permeated this room and calmed him. It was cool and empty, this cavern in the center of the ship.

Mindlessly, he began to check the system, scrutinizing the calibrations he'd already performed hundreds of times. It wasn't necessary anymore, he reminded himself. The worst was over.

He breathed out a huge sigh and sat on a storage box in a corner, leaning against the cool metallic walls of the room. Finally, he felt his body relax and absorb the peace and quiet of the ship that enveloped him.

He didn't know how long he spent sitting there, but when he finally roused himself from his half-slumber, he felt himself drawn out of the quiet, dark sanctuary. He headed towards the elevator, up to Shepard's cabin. He would wait for her there.

**Shepard**

The doors to the port cargo bay clicked shut behind her. Javik was bent over the table to the right of the entrance. He was heavily bandaged, like much of the ground team, but the Protheans' legendary toughness was visible in him now.

"Commander," he said in his deep voice. "You have done more than was possible in my time. It was an honor to witness the moment when the Reapers failed."

"It was fifty thousand years in the making," she replied.

"More than that," the solemn prothean intoned. "Untold numbers of cycles struggled in vain against the synthetics."

"Not in vain," Shepard soothed. "Their contributions helped put an end to the Reapers' cycles. Without their work, we would never have succeeded."

She held her hand out, the prothean memory shard he had given her before the battle in her outstretched palm.

"I know you want to put your people to rest, and I know you want me to keep this as a reminder of your people. But I wanted to ask you to add to it once more. Your contribution should be noted."

Javik took the shard from her hand, looking at it almost reverently.

"I would be honored to make my memories part of this history."

"You have a unique place in history, Javik," she said. "The last prothean – witness to the final battle for the galaxy. You're a survivor, and a voice of your people."

He nodded, a slight gesture. She hesitated a moment, not sure how he would receive what she had to say next.

"Javik," she began, calmness in her voice masking the uncertainty she was feeling. "I know you wanted to return to the Cronian nebula after this and put… everything to rest."

He nodded again.

"Yes," he said. "That is correct."

"Please reconsider," she continued. "I know it must be lonely for you, but you have so much to offer. Liara would be devastated if she didn't get a chance to write her book with you."

Javik's mouth twitched at that. Shepard was pretty sure he had never smiled in his life, but that may have been a twinge of humor in his usually dour expression.

"There's always room for you aboard this ship," she added. "Your journey doesn't have to end here."

"I will consider your offer," Javik said.

Shepard nodded, and left him to his memories. She snuck a glance behind her as she left the room and saw him lean forward, resting his arms on the table, staring firmly at the memory shard.

The door closed behind her again. She had spoken with almost everyone aboard. Joker had looked relieved to say the least, hiding his obvious discomfort with the emotion of this reunion behind jokes about the Reapers. She didn't dare tell him about the visions she'd had under the indoctrination attempt. She knew he would run with them. EDI had been calm as always, but Shepard noted the gradual change in her over this journey. Her formerly distant serenity had a focus now, and that focus was often on Joker. Shepard grinned.

_I saw that one coming long before the attack on the Collector base._

She prided herself on her emotional knowledge of her crew. They didn't just have to be in good working condition to be the team she knew they were: their hearts counted, too. It was far too easy for a soldier to lock up what was inside. She knew that too well. It had been her responsibility to coax that heart out from inside her crew. They were her family. They had her to fall back on.

There was a time when she had lain awake deep into the night, wearily wondering who _she_ had to fall back on when the fate of the galaxy on her shoulders weighed too much. Now, she just smiled.

One more stop to make before she could retreat to her quarters for a hot shower and a soft bed.


	4. Savoring

**Chapter 4: "Savoring"**

**Shepard**

The doors to the med bay opened and she caught sight of Doctor Chakwas sitting at her usual chair, bent over a datapad.

"Got a minute?" she asked the doctor.

"Of course, Shepard. It's good to have you back," the motherly figure stood and gestured Shepard over.

Chakwas pulled a glass bottle filled with amber liquid down from a shelf.

"Serrice Ice Brandy," Chakwas said. "I'm glad we didn't open this before. Victory is the best seasoning."

"I couldn't agree more," Shepard said, taking a seat across from the doctor.

Chakwas poured each of them a glass and raised hers in a toast.

"To the health of the galaxy," she said, "and the woman who saved it."

Shepard felt herself grow red. She was uncomfortable before the heavy praise of others. She was only human – just a soldier doing her job. It just so happened that chance had thrown her into an investigation three years ago that put her in the unique position of herald to the reapers' eventual arrival.

Shepard raised her own glass: "And to the doctor who kept all of us going."

They clinked their glasses together and took a first sip. Chakwas sighed contentedly and leaned back in her chair.

"Shepard, you have seen us through terrors worse than the darkest nightmare, and yet here we are. We're still here, and the galaxy will live another day."

"Yes. But we paid a high price," Shepard replied, her voice sounding heavier than she had intended.

Chakwas lowered her head, an unconscious motion, paying respect to those lost.

She raised her glass again: "To Ashley," she said. "A more dedicated soldier I've never seen."

Shepard raised her glass and clinked again.

"And sweet Tali," the doctor said quietly. "May her ancestors watch over her and bring her through this. I would like to go down to the forward operating base tomorrow and see if there is anything I can do."

"Of course," Shepard replied. "I'll tell Major Coats to give you admittance to the facility."

"Thank you, Shepard. I won't be much use on the ship until we depart. I would like to do something helpful while we are here."

Shepard raised her glass again: "We couldn't ask for a better doctor, or a better person, aboard this ship. It has been an honor to serve with you."

Nearly an hour passed before she left the med bay and fumbled her way to the elevator. While not as falling-down-drunk as she had been the last time she and the good doctor had opened a bottle of brandy together, she felt a slight buzzing in her head. Perhaps it was the exhaustion and perhaps it was the alcohol, but all she wanted to do was lie down.

When the doors to her cabin opened and she entered, she was pleased to see a long, lithe figure bent into the chair at her desk. Garrus was reading something on his datapad and looked up when he heard the door open. He smiled – funny how she could read the subtle expressions on his turian features now – and rose, crossing the room to her.

"It didn't feel right to sit alone in the battery," he explained. "I hope you don't mind that I let myself in."

"You're always welcome here, Garrus," she said, reaching up to bring his face down to her level so she could kiss his cheek softly.

He brought his arms around her gently. In his uniform, he was much softer. She could mold herself into him better, so she loved those rare occasions when he chose not to wear his armor. She nuzzled into his shoulder now and he buried his face in her hair, mandibles tugging softly at the strands and sending a shiver down her skin. His hands stroked her back gently, pulling her softly closer to him.

For a moment, his hands went still, and Shepard wondered if something was wrong. Then, he chuckled softly. The reverberations transferred from his chest to her own and she felt them all the way down to her toes.

"Have you been drinking, little Spectre?" he chided jokingly.

"Doctor Chakwas and I opened another bottle of brandy. It's a tradition," she explained. "I only had one glass this time."

He chuckled again, and she looked up to meet his eyes.

"Well, she might have refilled it once," she confessed.

He tipped her back into a deep kiss, and his blue eyes were dancing with laughter.

"Just once?" he asked.

She nodded and felt him lifting her feet from the ground. He carried her over to her bed and set her gently down.

"Should I just let you sleep it off?" he teased.

"No," she said. "Stay here with me."

In truth, the effects of the alcohol were already wearing off, replaced by the effects of a warm bed, warm embrace, and warm gaze. She sat up, running a hand softly down the scars on Garrus's face. She loved and hated those scars at the same time. Hated them because they reminded her that she had almost lost him once – before she had even realized what he meant to her. Loved them because they were his, and because they made him _real._ A soldier, like her.

He was watching her closely as she explored his scars with her fingers. He scooted closer on the bed and took her hand from his face, gently nuzzling it before setting it down on the covers and moving his own hands to her clothing.

She helped him remove her shirt, and as she let the fabric fall beside the bed, she felt his palms press softly against her shoulders. She let him gently push her down, letting the soft, cool sheets soothe her shoulders. Her wounds had nearly healed. Still sensitive, they no longer needed bandages, but were twisted red welts along her right shoulder, down her arm, curving around her side to her hips.

Careful not to touch, Garrus examined each wound. His fingers traced lightly down the smooth parts of her skin instead and her body relaxed with every soft touch.

"A girl could get used to this," she murmured.

He looked up, as though startled, and leaned down to touch their foreheads together.

"You like this?" he asked softly.

"Mmmhmm."

"Good," he said, and resumed his ministrations.

With every light touch to her skin, Shepard felt the burden of the last few days fall away. She watched Garrus as he examined her. The fierceness in his eyes as he traced her body with his gaze was powerful. He seemed to be committing her to memory: every last part.

In the hours before the Omega 4 relay, and even in the rare nights they had been able to languish together on the Normandy these past few weeks, their lovemaking had spoken of desperation and passion. Love, of course, but the sort of frantic love that might be rent in two by the death of one or both of them at any moment.

"_Every bullet we've ever dodged could have been the one."_

He'd been right, she knew. And their fates were still uncertain, even now. They were warriors, and that line of work brought with it a terrible risk. But at least for now, they could slow down. At least for now, they could entertain visions of settling down, of growing old. At least for now, they could savor each other.

Garrus's hands moved lower, gliding softly over the tops of her hipbones. She felt her breathing quicken and she pulled him down to lie beside her.

Her fingers loosened the fastenings of his shirt and slid it off. She explored him the way he had explored her, running the soft pads of her fingers across the rough hide that stretched across the plates of his chest, carefully avoiding his own recent wounds, then down to the softer muscles of his stomach. He breathed out, almost a hiss, and she watched his eyes close in pleasure.

In a swift move, he was above her, holding his body inches above her own.

"Shepard," he murmured, his breath hot against her face, smelling of a deep forest. She loved the alien scent of him, and she brought her face closer, kissing his mouth, seeking out the edges of his plates and his teeth with her tongue. She knew this act was unique to humans, but just as she had learned that when he rubbed the side of his face against her jaw he wanted her to stroke his mandibles, he had learned what she was looking for with this exploration. And he complied, his rough tongue snaking out from his mouth, twisting with hers and joining their mouths in a way that felt so _intimate _to her. She kneaded the skin beneath his fringe, coaxing out a moan from deep within.

But then he pulled back. He sat poised above her, gently sliding the remainder of her clothing from her body. He traced the length of her legs, his fingers seeking the taut lines of muscle beneath the skin. Again, she watched as he seemed to lose himself in the sight of her naked form, the muscles of his shoulders hunched beneath his carapace. Studying her, as if he'd never truly seen her before.

"Garrus?" she asked softly.

"Yes, Shepard?"

"Something on your mind?"

"What is it you humans say? 'This is the first day of the rest of our lives.'"

She nodded, encouraging him on.

"Well, now that the reapers are gone, I can't imagine a phrase that fits better."

She smiled, "Me either."

"I just don't want to rush forward, living every day like it's a battle," he said. "I've had enough battles for my time."

"I know you have," she said softly. "We both have."

"Primarch Victus offered me a job," he confessed.

"He did?"

She sat up now, feeling her heartbeat quicken.

"Yes. He wants me to be the new turian councilor."

She could feel her surprise showing on her face – the way her mouth was making a little "o" and her eyes were wide. She quickly brought her lips back together.

"But you hate politics," was all she could think to say. "It's why you left C-Sec."

"I know," he said. "But I have to say, I'm tempted at the thought. A nice, safe job. Apartment on the citadel. No one shooting at me for a change."

"You sure about that, Garrus? The Council hasn't exactly had it easy the past few years."

"Yeah, but I'm going to blame that one on the Reapers," he paused, his expression thoughtful. "Things could be different, now. A new council, a new galaxy. It might give me the chance to make a difference. Make things better, somehow."

She smiled up at him, and he returned the affectionate gaze. He started to work his way down her legs again, exploring every inch with the soft undersides of his hands.

"I could come home at night to you. Every night. In _our_ home."

His voice was fierce when he said those words, and they came out a passionate growl. She felt a shiver run through her body when he turned up those passionate tones in his voice.

His hands had worked down to her ankles and now wrapped around the arch of her feet, exploring. She drew back involuntarily when he trailed a finger across the sensitive arches.

"Ticklish," she explained.

He laughed softly.

"I'll never understand that reflex," he purred softly. "It seems so… silly."

He touched her feet differently now, examining them reverently. The curve of the arch, the delicate little toes, the fine lines of bone visible through the skin. She realized how alien it must look to him.

As if he'd read her mind, he mused softly as he ran a finger from the top of her big toe up to the delicate bones of her ankle:

"The human body is…" a pause, and a deep breath as he looked up her body, "not what I had expected outside of armor."

He let his fingers trail up her legs as he moved his own body up her own.

"So soft," he said, running his palms against the skin of her thighs. "So fragile," he said, examining the prominence of her collarbone against her chest. "But so strong," he said, and brought both hands to her waist, drawing his grip down the muscles of her abdomen.

She arched her back into his touch and he chuckled again.

"And flexible," he growled.

He nuzzled her neck and then nipped her shoulder lightly, sending a spark down her body into the depths of her abdomen. She met his eyes, feeling the heat growing between her thighs. She reached over to him and slid the waistband of his pants down. He helped her remove the pants, preventing them from tangling in his spurs, and reached an arm down to lift her at the small of her back. He sat on the bed, leaning back against the pillows, and pulled her into his lap.

She wrapped her arms around his neck, seeking all the spots he had told her were sensitive. He responded with a moan and tilted his head back.

Gently, with great care to avoid the rough and twisted battle lines on her body, he pulled her closer, locking eyes.

She eased herself down, guiding him into her. They both sighed in unison as she settled around him, absorbing the intimacy of that connection.

"I love you," he said, his voice catching as she started to sway her hips against him.

"I love you too, Garrus," she said.

She moved softly against him, and nothing more was said. Eyes locked together, no words were necessary as they shared their bodies, giving each other pleasures that reached the deepest parts of their bodies and their souls.

Foreheads touching, she rocked gently against his hips, hands exploring every soft spot on his neck, beneath his fringe, and inside his armored carapace. He let his hands knead the smooth curves of her body. She felt her quads and hip flexors clench and relax against the gentle pressure of his palms, and saw in his eyes the way each undulation of her hips brought cloudy bliss to his normally piercing blue eyes. He looked at her, both far away and closer than he'd ever been.

Finally, the soft to and fro of her pelvis brought sounds from him that she hadn't heard since the night before they'd landed on earth. Low, rumbling sounds of pleasure that reverberated through her body. She responded with her own low noises, soft moans, and – when his hands abandoned her musculature and searched for her softest, most sensitive parts – involuntary whimpers. She had told him once the effect his voice had on her, and it seemed the noises she made had a similar effect on him. For every moan, he tilted his pelvis into her, and for every whimper, she saw the fire rise up in his eyes, saw the way his fringe darkened with blue blood.

Every touch was electric, and she found herself growing warmer, feeling her skin tingle from head to toe. Garrus pulled her closer, and she could feel the warmth of his body and the way he _needed _her. The pleasure in his eyes was heavy, and she felt their pace quicken, heard their moans intensify. Finally, it was too much for both of them to keep their gaze – the intensity was too much and she watched his eyes flutter and close, watched his head arc back. The tingling spread and the warmth between her legs became a fire that threatened to incinerate her where she sat. She threw her own head back and abandoned herself to the involuntary, sensuous noises that were coming out of her.

She felt herself clench around him as waves of pleasure coursed through her body and she cried out, calling his name, pulling him close and pressing her torso against his. He followed her with a deep throaty growl into oblivion, holding onto her hips with his strong grip and nipping at her shoulder.

Afterwards, she curled into his arms, letting the rise and fall of his chest lull her into a deep, dreamless sleep.

**Garrus**

In the hazy moments before waking, he was aware of her soft, cool skin against him and the pleasing smell of her. He breathed it in: the salty fragrance from her perspiration, the honeyed undertones of her skin and hair, and the faintest remaining traces of the earthy scent of her arousal.

He opened his eyes, blinking in the dark. The skylight in her cabin revealed the green and spinning planet below, darkened with night. The red glow of embers betrayed the fires that still burned across the globe, though most had been snuffed out by now.

He glanced down at Shepard, his eyes adjusted to the dark. Her hair fell over her face and dripped down her neck like water. She shifted and sighed, just beneath the surface of waking as well. Garrus lightly brushed the hair back from her face, feeling its softness and its lightless on his talons.

Her eyes fluttered open and she smiled at his touch. Then she frowned.

"What time is it?" she mumbled, her lips heavy with sleep.

Garrus checked his omnitool.

"Just after oh-six-hundred ship time," he said. "We're on the dark side of earth, now. It's night time."

She followed his gaze up to the skylight and they watched in silence.

"There's still so much left to be done," she said. "Still so much damage to repair."

"Yes," Garrus acknowledged, "but you have given us the chance to make those repairs in peace."

"How are things on Palaven?" she asked.

"Better," he said, propping himself up with an elbow and smiling down at her. "The Reapers left Palaven when they took the Citadel to Earth and gave the civilians there time to start cleanup."

"There's such a thing as a turian civilian?" she joked.

"Yes," he replied dryly, teasing her back. "Before enlistment and after retirement."

She laughed at that.

"Okay, big guy," she said, sliding out from under the covers. "I've got to get up."

He caught her around her waist with one long arm.

"Do you have to?" he asked, his voice a low purr. "I think you've earned a vacation."

"Yes, I have to," she said firmly, but didn't resist his embrace. "I want to get down to the hangar deck to do some laps and limber up. It's been a while since I've worked out with the punching bag."

"I know another way you could limber up," Garrus crooned, loving the goosebumps that rose on her skin when he lowered his voice this way. Humans wore their every feeling literally on the surface of their skin, if you knew how to read it well enough.

She smiled, but loosed herself from his grip and stood, pulling on underwear, loose athletic pants, and a modest sports bra.

"How did I manage to find the one human in the galaxy with more turian self-control than I have?"

She threw a grin his way as she tied her hair up with a rubber band.

"Maybe that's what attracted you to me in the first place."

"Maybe," he mused.

Watching her throw her gear together, he smiled. And decided to goad her a little.

"It couldn't have been the way you almost dance on the battlefield," he said, keeping his voice in its low register. "Or the way you are absolutely incorruptible in your values."

He sat up, leaning forward so he could see the pleased little smile at the corners of her mouth as she splashed water on her face in the bathroom.

"And it certainly couldn't have been that damned sexy shape of yours, since I made it clear to you that I don't have a fetish for humans," he smiled as he said this, his eyes drawn to the fluid motion of the strong muscles in her torso (what had she called them? "Abs"?) as she bent down to pick up her gym bag.

She was grinning from ear to ear as she crossed to the bed, where he still lay, an impish expression on his face.

"How _did_ you manage to get under my skin?" he asked.

She leaned down, kissing one of his mandibles softly. Then, she nipped her blunt teeth against his neck, sending chills down his body.

"I have no idea," she whispered. "Let me know if you figure it out."

And with that, she was gone, leaving him with a sigh to get out of bed and get on with the day.

_Author's note: Whoo, things got a little hot there. There won't be too many of those scenes, because in my humble opinion, Shep and Garrus are about so much more than interspecies intercourse. However, it doesn't feel right to leave them out entirely, since they do seem like a couple who probably enjoy getting each other into bed ;)_

_Next chapter, we'll start moving forward more with the plot, now that we've given (most of) our heroes a chance to regroup. I've been playing with two ideas for this: either write it as serial (The Adventures of Shepard and Garrus!) or as a novel with a concrete beginning, middle, and end. I could go either way - drop me a line and let me know if you have a preference :)_


	5. He Was Proud of You

**Chapter 5: "He was proud of you"**

**Joker**

He still couldn't quite believe that he didn't have to be on edge for sudden bombardment. Simply sitting in orbit, while a nice and relaxing change of pace, was unnerving after weeks of constant adrenaline. He had stopped drinking coffee entirely, something which had concerned EDI. She had asked him multiple times if he was feeling alright, or if his memory was affected. She even offered to bring him some coffee herself, which was when he'd explained to her that he didn't need to be any more jumpy or he might accidentally pilot the ship straight into one of the many geosynchronous satellites around Earth.

"That joke was not funny, Jeff," she'd told him matter-of-factly.

Well, at least she kept his ego in check, right? He glanced over at her sleek robotic body and grinned to himself. Man, he had it good.

"I heard you and the AI were shacking up – I had to see it for myself," drawled a voice from behind him.

"Jack. What a pleasure to have you back on board," Joker replied, spinning his seat around to face the tattooed biotic. He always felt more than a little uncomfortable when she was within visual range of him. As much good as the Commander had done for her, she was still one giant, dangerous ball of crazy.

"Stuff it, cripple," Jack retorted. "So EDI got a sexy new body and now you two are doing the nasty. Don't you think you've taken this whole 'I love my ship' thing to an extreme?"

"While I am linked with the _Normandy_, I am capable of self-modifying my core programming in accordance with my own unique decisions. Since Jeff removed my shackles, I have free will. I am, in every sense, a person, not a ship," EDI interjected in her calm, expository manner.

Joker waved her off, "I got this one, EDI." He turned back to Jack: "You would know about extremes, Jack. There's a Prothean in the cargo hold if you want to try something new. That would be a _real_ novelty, wouldn't it?"

"Fuck off," Jack snapped, but he counted it a win that she didn't open up a biotic can of whoop-ass on him.

"What are you even doing onboard the _Normandy_ anyway?" He asked.

"Shepard said she'd give us a lift to the Citadel, since you're going there anyway. The kids are coming too. Fucking war heroes," she smiled a little at that one, her voice swelling with pride.

Joker smiled at that, but didn't shoot back with sarcasm like he might usually do. They had all earned a little respect.

"I guess they should rename the _Normandy _the _War Hero Express._ Doesn't quite have the same ring, though," he finally said.

"Fuck yeah," said Jack.

"So when are the kids coming aboard?"

"Tomorrow. Why?"

"Just want to know when I should reinstate the swear jar. There's not a lot of money in fighting reapers."

"Fuck you."

**Shepard**

Shepard took a deep breath of Earth's acrid air when the shuttle landed. This would probably be the last time she set foot on a planet with breathable air for a long time, and while she was more at home aboard the _Normandy_ than on any terrestrial sphere, there was something about recycled air that just got old.

Hackett had sent word that morning that the Citadel was back in place, and Shepard was more than ready to return to her mission. Cortez had brought her back to the forward operating base in London one last time before they plotted a course for the Serpent Nebula.

"Meet you back here in three hours," she called over her shoulder to Cortez, who was locking the shuttle down in the dock.

"Yes ma'am," he called back.

She headed for the base. Two days since she had last been there, and things were already so different. Earth was already beginning the slow process of rebuilding, but reports claimed that all reaper presence was gone from the planet. The guerilla wars that had been fought in the streets of every city had left destruction in their wake, but those wrecked alleyways and boulevards were silent now. Here and there, she spotted handfuls of people clearing away rubble and broken glass.

It would take years, but organic life would persist.

When she entered the hospital, she went straight to Tali's room. Liara was still there, focused intently on her datapad. She looked up when Shepard entered the room.

"Shepard," she said. "I am ready when you are."

Shepard nodded: "How is Tali?"

"She is showing great improvement, but they are keeping her sedated. Admiral Raan has asked to remain behind with a few of the quarian ships so that she will be here when she is stable enough to be moved back to Rannoch."

"Rannoch," Shepard murmured. "She'll be glad to go home."

"Yes," Liara said. "I believe she will."

They stood in silence for a moment, listening to the quiet of the room and watching the gentle rise and fall of Tali's chest.

"She'll be alright," Shepard heard herself say.

"Yes," Liara responded. "And I have an agent here who will keep us apprised of her status."

Shepard smiled, not surprised in the least.

"Thank you, Liara."

"Of course."

Shepard sighed, reluctant to leave. Liara placed a cool hand on her forearm.

"I need to stop by and see Vega before I go," Shepard told her. "Cortez is meeting us at the shuttle in just under two hours."

"Understood," Liara said. "I will meet you there."

Shepard reached out to squeeze Tali's gloved, three-fingered hand one last time before she left. Liara's voice reached her just before she reached the doorway.

"Shepard?"

She stopped, looking back over her shoulder at her blue friend.

"They found Anderson this morning," Liara said quietly. "Under the rubble near the beam site. I will let you know if hear of any arrangements for his funeral, but I'm sure Hackett will speak to you about that."

A heaviness spread over Shepard's body. She hadn't deluded herself into believing he was alive, not in all that devastation. She knew the conversation they had on the Citadel had been a projection of him, that he had never made it to the beam, but hearing that his body had been recovered…

"Thank you, Liara," she said.

"He would have been proud of you Shepard. He already was. He never truly doubted you."

She smiled a little at that, knowing that Liara was speaking both from her heart and from the mountains of data she collected as the Shadow Broker. Shepard gave a slight nod, her throat thick.

Then she left, closing the door quietly behind her.

**Garrus**

When Shepard had boarded the shuttle for her brief trip to Earth, Garrus had taken the few hours of silence before their return to the Citadel to contact his father and sister. Back in the battery, he brought video chat up on his console and connected with them aboard the refugee ship they had fled Palaven on.

"Hey, Sol," he said warmly when his sister answered.

"Garrus!" she said, her eyes sparkling. "Let me get father."

She had vanished for a brief second, then returned with their father in tow. Even as he aged, the elder Vakarian held himself in the strong posture of a lifetime military man. Duty, honor, the self subsumed for the good of the whole. His father was the turian Garrus had never been.

And yet, he saw a flicker of a smile in his father's mandibles as he relayed what had happened on Earth.

"Thank you," Garrus said as he finished retelling the events of the past week. "Thank you for going to the Primarch with me months ago. We needed everyone to work together to defeat the reapers, and we did it."

"The whole galaxy united," his father mused. "I never thought I would see the day."

Garrus ducked his head slightly.

"I wish mother could have seen it," he said. "A bright new future for the galaxy."

"She can see it," his father replied. "Through you, Spirits willing. You have so much of her in you."

Garrus felt a warm glow in his heart at those words. Solana linked an arm with their father, expressing solidarity. How alike those two were.

His father took a deep breath then and raised himself up to stand straighter.

"I'm sure you have much to do, son," he said. "When we are back on Palaven, we will let you know."

Garrus nodded, "Thanks, father. Our next stop is the Citadel – I'll send you a message when we dock."

With that, the elder Vakarian retreated from the video chat. Solana watched him go, then turn her attention back to Garrus.

"Don't be a stranger, Gar," she said. "Come home sometime."

"I will," he said.

"He's right, you know," she continued. "You are so much like mother. I'm glad you were here for…"

Garrus looked down at the console, allowing her unfinished sentence to hang between them. He had been grateful to make it home for his mother's last days. Being away for so long had been necessary, he had convinced himself, but it ate at him. His brief time on Palaven had soothed so many old wounds, at least once Sol and his mother had recovered from his facial scarring and resolved themselves to the truth that his marriage prospects had greatly decreased. But most importantly, it had given his mother solace in her dying days.

"I'm glad, too, Sol," he said. "Take care."

"I will, brother."

He watched as her image flashed to black on the screen. A strange peace began to fill him. _Home. Palaven. They are returning home._

He remained there in the battery, in the silence, with only his thoughts as his companion, as he so often did.

**Shepard**

When she entered Vega's room, she knocked softly on the door frame. There was an Alliance officer standing at Vega's bedside, and the two were speaking quietly. They looked up when she knocked, and Vega's face broke into a lopsided smile.

"Hey there Lola," he said, then glanced quickly up at the officer and corrected himself: "I mean, _Commander_."

"Vega," she said, "You got a minute?"

"Sure, Commander. Captain Marshall here and I were just talking about my training."

Shepard cast a look at the captain standing beside Vega's bed in well-worn armor. She recognized him – only vaguely – from her early days in N7. She saluted him.

"Captain."

He saluted her back: "At ease, Commander."

She relaxed, and Marshall nodded to her. He turned back to James and shook his hand.

"We'll see you in Vancouver, Lieutenant," he said. "When the doctors here give you the go-ahead, we'll book you on an Alliance ship to HQ."

"Looking forward to starting my training," Vega replied.

Marshall turned to leave, slowing as he passed Shepard. He looked at her as though he wanted to say something. She made eye contact with him, and he seemed to change his mind.

"Commander Shepard," he acknowledged her, nodding to her as he left the room.

She approached Vega's hospital bed, crossing her arms and relaxing into a casual stance.

"You must be going crazy cooped up in here," she said.

"The doctors won't even let me out of this bed. It's driving me loco. I feel fine."

He pushed himself up to sit straighter in bed, hiding a grimace as the movement unsettled the still-healing wounds. Shepard suppressed a smile - he was stubborn, but the doctors were right to keep him in bed until everything was stronger.

"I hear you, but they know what they're doing," she told him. "You're lucky you made it out at all. Harbinger made a mess of you."

He smiled, that cock-sure grin spreading across his face: "Eh, it wasn't so bad. It'd take more than a reaper to bring me down."

"Worse than a reaper, huh?" She nearly shuddered at the thought: "let's hope we never find out what _that_ looks like."

He nodded.

"Agreed."

"So, you're about to start your N7 training, huh?"

He hesitated, and a serious look came over the craggy features of his face.

"Yeah," he said. "Yeah, as soon as I'm out of here. It's crazy," he paused. "This is all I ever would have wanted before the reapers arrived. I didn't ever dream I'd make it here, especially after Fehl. But now…"

He paused again, and Shepard tilted her head. She waited for him to gather his thoughts.

"Now, everything feels so different. I don't think anybody believed we were getting out of this one, and going back to normal life just feels… wrong."

"You don't want this anymore?" she asked calmly.

He looked up, surprise in his eyes.

"Hell, yes, I want it," he said. "I guess I just need to get used to the idea of having a future, now. I thought for sure that this would be it. And now, it – a future, N7, everything – is actually real."

"Yeah," she said. "I know what you mean. After the Collector base, I didn't know what to do with myself. Hell, I'd already died once and was brought back, and now I'd cheated death a second time. I knew the reapers were coming, and I knew my mission was to stop them, but the day-to-day…"

The intonation of her voice rose with those last words as she remembered. She had left Cerberus. Her team was splitting up, going their separate ways. Until Hackett had called with the mission on Aratoht, she had felt like a ghost: stuck between two worlds, trying to deliver a message to people who couldn't or wouldn't believe her, unable to do anything to stop the reapers from arriving.

"I didn't know what to do with myself, Vega," she concluded after a long pause.

"And now?" he asked.

She laughed, "Cheating death a third time? Feels about the same. I have no idea what's next, but at least Hackett wasted no time giving me an assignment. And now that the reapers are defeated, I doubt that everyone will keep getting along. If there's one thing you can count on sentient life for, it's coming up with petty reasons to fight with each other. A spectre will always have work."

"Yeah," Vega agreed. "You can say that again."

She smiled at him.

"If you need anything, Vega, you know where to reach me. You'll do well in N7. People like you are exactly what we need, now more than ever."

"Aw, gee, Lola," he said, his grin spreading across his face once again, "You're makin' me blush."

"Don't let it go to your head, soldier," she cautioned, winking at him. "Do us proud."

"Yes, ma'am," he said, one hundred percent marine.

She turned to leave.

"Hey, Lola," he said, shifting forward more in his hospital bed. "You tell Scars he better be on his A game. And you, too. Take care of yourself."

"I will, Vega," she said.

She met Liara and Cortez at the shuttle and they made the short return trip to the _Normandy_. Shepard barely noticed the time passing: she was thinking about what Vega had said. They would all have to get used to the idea of having a future. She knew the last six months to three years had weighed on her various crewmates. Some had been with her through the entire ordeal, and while she felt she knew them well, she couldn't quite be certain that they all felt the same unease that she did.

She had believed she would die. As much as she wanted to live – as much as she had shared Garrus's desire to try their hand at normal life together as a couple – she had still felt a deep need to tell him that even if (when) she did not return from this mission, she would be part of him on a deep level, a spiritual level. Hell, she didn't even know if she believed in that, but she had wanted Garrus to know that she would still be with him. She hadn't wanted him to feel alone, as much as she had _known_ that he would be.

But she had been wrong. Again. For the third time, she had returned from certain (and actual, in one case) death.

She knew her whole team had expected a tough fight. But how many of them had truly believed they would not come back from this?

And now the galaxy was slowly crawling its way back to normalcy, and she realized she hadn't the slightest idea what that even meant.

When the shuttle docked in the _Normandy's_ bay, Shepard took the elevator up to the CIC. She issued the order for Joker to set a course to the Serpent Nebula. And then she stood there, oblivious to Joker's uneasy glances in her direction, silently watching the planets pass by the windows of the cockpit, until they reached the mass relay and everything blurred into the blue light of relay travel.


	6. Captain Shepard

**Chapter 6: "Captain Shepard"**

**Shepard**

They arrived at the Serpent Nebula at oh-eight-hundred Citadel time. Hackett was still on the Citadel, since they had only arrived back in the Serpent Nebula the prior evening. He was due to report back to his ship that afternoon, and had requested that she meet him in the human embassy before then.

As Shepard stepped off the _Normandy_ into the docking bay, she felt her stomach flip. Already, the Keepers had repaired much of what she knew had been substantial damage. She had not seen any of the familiar Citadel neighborhoods when she had come up in the beam, but remembering the hallucinated corridor of rotting corpses and the strange shifting walkways made her skin crawl. She didn't know what of that vision had been real – only a few things were patently false – but it all blended together horrifically in her mind.

Garrus stepped onto the gangplank behind her and stood at her elbow.

"You alright?" he asked softly.

She shook her head.

"We can talk later," she told him. "I need to meet Hackett."

He nodded. "I'm meeting with the Primarch, but I have the afternoon free. Lunch on the presidium?"

She smiled up at him, gently brushing his carapace with her fingers.

"That sounds great," she said sincerely.

They walked in comfortable silence through the docking bay and to the elevator, parting with a quick smile at the embassy level.

She strode through the doors of the human embassy, C-Sec officers parting to allow her access. Hackett was waiting inside, his back to the door as he looked out over the presidium.

"Admiral," she said, announcing her arrival.

"Commander," Hackett turned, and a soft smile spread across his face. Shepard wondered for a moment if she'd ever actually seen him smile – but then it was gone, and he was back to his usual cool and reserved self.

"Thank you for coming, Commander. We have a matter that requires your attention."

"Sir?" she asked.

"Since the battle for Earth, there has been some unusual merc activity. The Blue Suns, Eclipse, and Blood Pack retreated in unison from the battle once the Crucible had taken out the majority of the reaper fleet. Then, just two days later, a team of Alliance marines on Omega suddenly went dark."

Shepard raised an eyebrow at that. She already had a hunch as to where this was going.

"I wasn't aware we had Alliance forces on Omega," she said, giving him a searching look.

"They're black ops. We sent them to infiltrate Cerberus's operation back when you were earthside."

"When I was grounded?" she asked, raising an eyebrow.

"We needed to get inside Cerberus's operations," he said, ignoring her prod, "and they were using Omega as a main transport hub. We sent a team there to see if they could get inside. They impersonated a Cerberus team during the chaos on Omega while Aria was fighting back."

"So we have a team inside Cerberus?"

"We did, until they went dark a few days ago. We have no evidence that their identities were compromised, and there has been no reaper activity detected outside of the Sol system, so we assumed the battle was contained to that system. There is no reason to assume reaper involvement on Omega, but as I'm sure you understand, we are taking all precautions."

"Of course, sir," Shepard responded.

"I've assigned two new marines to your command on the Normandy for this mission. As a spectre, of course, you can choose your own team, but I highly recommend these marines accompany you to Omega. They are two of our best new N7 graduates, and I would prefer you have an Alliance presence for this assignment."

She nodded. She had lost Ashley, and now Vega was pursuing N7 training on Earth. Aside from Joker and the crew, her team on the _Normandy_ had been reduced to a turian general, an AI, an asari scientist, and a Prothean with a death wish. Liara wished to return to her work as the Shadow Broker, Garrus was about to become the turian councilor, and Javik – well, Javik wanted to return to his homeworld and commit suicide. That left her with EDI, and she could understand why Hackett might be a little unsettled by the sparse support.

"Understood," she told the admiral.

"They are reporting to the _Normandy_ as we speak. Which brings me to," he paused, "less serious matters. There will be a ceremony this evening at eighteen hundred hours on the presidium. It will serve a dual purpose: as a victory celebration and commemoration of your role in defeating the reapers, as well as your promotion ceremony."

Her eyes widened at that.

"Sir – " she began, but he waved her off.

"Commander, your service to the Alliance – to the entire galaxy – goes beyond typical commendation. And your position as a spectre complicates matters. But all that said, a promotion is long overdue. All charges in the Aratoht incident have been dropped, and the Alliance Navy has seen fit to promote you to captain. You will retain command of the _Normandy_ and your crew. And God knows what role you will play in our new galaxy. I'm sure it will be a grand one."

There was that slight smile again. He nodded at her, and then saluted. She returned the gesture.

"Dismissed, Commander. I will see you this evening."

Shepard left the room, her head still spinning. It wasn't that she didn't feel she deserved a promotion. It had just been the last thing on her mind.

_I'm going to have to get readjusted to business as usual, _she thought for the umpteenth time.

She still had time before she had arranged to meet with Garrus for lunch, so she set herself on a course for the docking bays.

A few minutes later, as she approached the _Normandy_, she caught sight of her new recruits. A tall, lean man in Alliance dress blues, his curly brown hair cropped short and neatly contained against his scalp. He stood straight, speaking in quiet tones with the blonde woman who leaned casually against the guard rails. She ran a hand through her short hair, which already had a devil-may-care messiness to it. From this distance, there was not much more Shepard could ascertain about these two, but as she drew close, the woman saw her coming and pushed away from the guard rail.

With a sauntering amble, the woman made straight for Shepard, pulling up into a crisp salute when she was a few paces away.

"Commander Shepard," she said, her voice strong and confident.

The man had turned at her sudden departure, and strode up to join her, his steps carefully measured. He saluted as well.

"At ease, soldiers," Shepard said, and the two relaxed into a softer stance.

She had pulled up their dossiers on her omni-tool as she had made her way to the _Normandy_, but she preferred to learn about her team in person.

"Lieutenant Ness," she said, looking at the woman whose entire being exuded conviction.

Lieutenant Tara Ness nodded, and Shepard realized that the woman was nearly as tall as her male companion when she wasn't slouching. She shifted her gaze over to the aforementioned – she checked her omnitool – Lieutenant Whitney Hanson.

"And Lieutenant Hanson," she added, looking the young man directly in his brown eyes. While Tara projected boldness and candor, Shepard read warmth and depth in this quiet man's eyes. She suspected he would be the more difficult of the two to loosen up.

_Then again, _she thought to herself with a quick, wry grin, _I've managed to connect with a tank-bred krogan, an asari justicar, and a geth. Surely two Alliance marines won't hold a candle to that. _

"Welcome aboard, lieutenants," she said, moving swiftly towards the ship. The two fell in line comfortably behind her.

"This is the _SSV Normandy_," she said. As the airlock hissed open in front of her, she directed them towards the currently-empty cockpit. "Get to know the crew. They are the heart and soul of this ship, especially our pilot, Jeff Moreau. Just call him Joker – only his girlfriend calls him Jeff."

Whitney nodded seriously, while Tara focused her intense gaze on every part of the _Normandy_. Shepard smiled at her eagerness – she had felt the same way the first time she boarded the _Normandy_. Hell, sometimes she was still in awe of this ship.

They hopped in the elevator towards the crew deck.

"Now, as a Spectre, I run a somewhat unorthodox operation," she explained to the recruits as the elevator hummed down to the lower floor. "I have an open-door policy, so if you run across anything that you don't… understand," she chose the word carefully, "I want you to know that you can come to me, no matter the situation. That goes for personal matters as well. My crew has to trust me – and I have to trust them. Loyalty has saved our asses more times than I can count."

The elevator opened and she whisked them out and around the corner.

"The medbay is ahead to the right. Doctor Chakwas is the best doctor I've had the opportunity to work with, and we're damned lucky to have her on this ship. She's an expert in xenobiology," Shepard noted the sudden upward tilt in Tara's chin at that, "and has patched me up more than I'm sure she'd have liked."

Tara continued to peer with interest at the medbay as Shepard led them into the mess hall, where Joker and EDI were sitting at the table, hands clasped together as Joker sipped a mug of coffee. Whitney's eyes widened when he caught the metallic digits interlaced with soft flesh and bone fingers.

"Like I said," Shepard said, "things are run a bit differently on my ship."

She caught his gaze and held it for a moment, searching for his reaction. He relaxed and nodded.

She faced Whitney and Tara and checked her omnitool for the time.

"Make yourselves at home. As long as Doctor T'Soni is with us, she will be in the XO's office," she nodded her head towards the office on the far side of the mess hall, "and she likes her privacy, though I think you will find her one of the most approachable of my team outside her quarters. We depart at oh-eight-hundred hours tomorrow, and until then, your time is yours."

She paused, watching the two lieutenants.

"Any questions?" she asked.

"No, ma'am," Whitney responded right away. Tara looked more pensive, and Shepard raised an eyebrow.

"Well, please don't hesitate to contact me if you ever do. I'm serious about that open-door policy."

A burst of laughter came from the table, where Joker was reacting to something EDI had said. Shepard smiled:

"Welcome to the team."

**Garrus**

The Primarch had already shown him to the turian councilor's office. Of course, the Hierarchy would be anxious to bring order back. To be without a councilor, even for a short while, was difficult for the strictly regimented culture of his people to stomach.

He had sent a private message to Shepard to meet him in the turian councilor's office. _His_ office. He shook his head. He had gone by a dextro restaurant on the Presidium and purchased a light turian lunch, then stopped by a levo restaurant and picked up something for Shepard – he wasn't quite sure what it was, but he had seen her eating it before in the _Normandy's_ mess hall.

Now, he stood gazing out the window, the food cooling on the desk, waiting. The room was large with vaulted ceilings. It was quiet.

It reminded him of his C-Sec days. It had been over two years since he had been in a quiet office like this, and even then, he had shared that office with multiple other C-Sec officers and there had been a constant buzz of activity around him. On the _Normandy_ he had had the hum of the engines. This was… strange.

He turned when he heard the whir of the door opening behind him. Shepard strode in, the soles of her Alliance uniform boots padding softly against the ground. A little flutter in his stomach jumped to his throat when she smiled widely at him.

"Shepard," he said.

"Hey, Garrus."

Her voice was softer than usual, affectionate. He crossed to her and pulled her into an embrace.

"I thought we could use a quiet lunch alone," he said, "in my new office."

She pulled back, and he saw a flicker of something cross her face. Those expressions were so fleeting – he hadn't learned to read them all yet.

"Wow," she said quietly. "You really are… the turian councilor."

She looked around, taking in the surroundings with her intelligent, observant gaze.

"So you're starting right away," she said – a question phrased as a statement.

"Yes," he said softly. "They've provided me with an apartment, this office, a security team, and Spirits know what else. It's still sinking in. Councilor Sparatus - well, it's not like he was expecting to be replaced, so I'm going in cold with no context. It'll take weeks to sort through all the paperwork, not to mention the briefings with the Hierarchy…"

He trailed off. Shepard was watching him, her gaze inscrutable, placid. But he knew something was going on in that head of hers.

"Garrus, are you sure this is what you want?"

He sighed. Of course he wasn't sure. And of course, she knew.

"Shepard," he began, finding himself already tripping over the thoughts before they could emerge as phrases. "I just want to make a place for myself. Do some good. I – I don't know how else to do that right now. I can't go back to being a vigilante, and C-Sec…" he paused, a small, ironic laugh escaping him, "well, after the reapers, C-Sec feels like small potatoes."

She smiled at that.

"No matter what you do, I'm behind you," she said firmly. "But remember there will always be a place for you on my team."

"Just on your team?"

She smirked at that, the corners of her lips turning upwards, and pushed herself up to her tiptoes to kiss his scarred mandible tenderly.

"You know you'll always have a place in my heart, Garrus," she whispered.

A shiver ran down his neck at the way her soft breath tickled his skin. He wrapped his arms around her, bracing her waist and dipping her down for a deep kiss. When he pulled her back up, she was grinning again.

"Charmer," she teased him. "I know your tricks."

He led her over to the desk and handed her the carton of food he had purchased for her. Taking his own meal, he sat on the couch, and she joined him, curling her legs up beneath her. He had never seen her do that anywhere but in her cabin – alone, with him. It was another clue he had learned meant _comfort, ease. _He smiled.

They ate, trading pleasant conversation with pauses as they took in the nourishment. The food was always better on the Citadel than the _Normandy_, and Garrus couldn't help but feel an excited tingle rise through him when he thought of the life they could build here. When she wasn't off on assignments, his Spectre mate would return to him – to the home he would make for her in the councilor's quarters.

And one day… well, he would save that topic for another time.

**Shepard**

"Attention to orders: the Prime Minister of the Systems Alliance, acting upon the recommendation of the commanding office of the fifth fleet, has…"

Shepard tried to focus as the head of the N7 program recited the customary words for a promotion ceremony. The Presidium was packed with people of all races. She could see Garrus, his eyes sparking with pride as he watched her. Liara stood beside him, her beatific smile brighter than Shepard had ever seen it.

Hackett stood by as well, her new recruits by his side – she was anxious to get to know them better. Her team was important to her. Not everyone she had served with had been her choice initially, but she had managed to build rapport with each and every one of them. These two would hopefully be no different, but since they departed first thing in the morning for Omega, she was concerned about the timing. Garrus would be remaining on the Citadel, and while she still had Liara for now…

She realized she had stopped listening to the ceremony – _her_ ceremony – and snapped her attention back.

"…Shepard is promoted to the grade of captain, Systems Alliance Navy."

She raised her right hand and read the oath of office in a calm voice, augmented and broadcast across the Presidium to the farthest reaches of the crowd. They pinned the badge to her uniform – a new stripe would be sewn into the shoulders to indicate her new rank.

She saluted her superior officer, who returned the salute. A line of Alliance marines shot blanks in unison, the symbolic gunshots a celebration. Music began, and as she relaxed out of the salute, she knew the party was only beginning. The Citadel would celebrate tonight – the victory against the reapers, despite the heavy losses, was deserving of a party like no other.

As she stepped away from the raised platform where the ceremony had taken place, she caught a familiar face at the bar nearby.

"Bailey!" She smiled, clapping him on the shoulder, gently. He was looking a little worse for the wear, leaning heavily on crutches, an ugly scar pushing its way down his face.

"Comma – er, Captain Shepard," he said, smiling back at her. "I think a thank you is in order."

"Just doing my job, Bailey," she said. "Glad to see you made it out alright. I hear it got pretty hairy on the Citadel when the Illusive Man arrived."

"Bastard cut through my forces. I lost a lot of good men – nearly lost my own life. I just wish I could have stopped him. This whole mess coulda been avoided."

"He was a step of ahead of all of us, Bailey. There was nothing more you could have done. Hell, if I had stopped him on Thessia…"

She stopped. Bailey was giving her a quizzical look. She sighed.

"It's all in the past," she said. "We made it out, and the galaxy survived. I'd say that's one hell of a job well done. On everyone's part."

"I can drink to that," Bailey said, raising his glass. "Can I buy you one?"

Shepard glanced over at Garrus, who caught her gaze and nodded to her. She had to mingle – as the honoree of the evening's festivities, she could hardly steal away – but he had promised to wait for her, to take her back to his new apartment at the end of the evening for one last night together before she departed for her new assignment.

She felt a pang in her gut, knowing he would not be coming with her. Her romantic feelings toward him aside, she always felt better when he was at her six.

But she supposed this was all part of settling into this new routine. And tonight, at least, they would celebrate. _And break in his new apartment_, she thought, feeling the smile at the corner of her lips become something a little deeper – a secret smile whose meaning only she and Garrus knew. And she saw from the way he looked out at her from beneath the ridges of his brow, his blue eyes smoldering in the darkness of the crowd, that he had read the meaning in that smile.

Late that night, once they had exhausted their passion, she lay awake, watching the stars and the blue-purple gas clouds of the Serpent Nebula. Garrus slept soundly beside her, his chest rising and falling in a peaceful rhythm. The night was quiet around them, and Shepard felt a quiet energy growing within her, setting her on edge in a way that was both frightful and beautiful.

It was unsettling, this new galaxy. She hadn't felt this way in years – since she set foot on the first _Normandy_. She had felt, then, an impatient thrill at all that was to come – all that she had not yet experienced, not yet mastered, not yet challenged.

The future – a future with Garrus, a future as a Spectre, and as a representative of humanity – it was _exciting_, she realized. The tedium and sluggishness she had expected was nowhere to be found. There would be more challenges – new obstacles to surmount. Yes, the reapers had been the greatest threat the galaxy had ever faced – probably the greatest threat it _would_ ever face. But she would be damned if she let that stop her from finding new adventures.

She was Commander – _Captain – _Shepard, and she had a future to build for herself

* * *

><p>Author's note: Thanks to everyone who has reviewed - and many thanks to my awesome beta, CyberianTsuinami. It should only get better from here, folks :) See you next chapter!<p> 


	7. Councilors and Reaper Tech

**Chapter 7: "Councilors and Reaper tech"**

**Tara**

Although she was technically on shore leave until morning, Tara felt no pull to leave the ship. The _Normandy _was a novelty to her, and the Citadel was a place she had already spent the past few days exploring, and she knew she would see it again countless times. It wasn't that the _Normandy_ was going anywhere soon – well, not without her, at least – but she had only just boarded the legendary vessel, and she'd be damned if she didn't absorb every last detail.

Joker had introduced himself shortly after Shepard had departed that afternoon, and in the scant hours before the victory ceremony, she had sat with him and EDI as he regaled her with stories of their exploits. She had suspected he was embellishing the stories perhaps more than he should have, but the stories that had reached her on her home on Eden Prime were equally grand and much harder to believe. She had observed the AI out of the corner of her eye as Joker blustered through his stories. There had been rumors in those stories of a Cerberus AI – the undertones had been sinister and dark. But as she watched the sleek bot interact with the pilot – she scoffed at the blatantly sexy design of the AI's platform – she had been amazed at how strangely _natural_ it felt.

It was simultaneously terrifying and invigorating.

After the ceremony, a party had raged into the night. Whitney had wandered off to introduce himself to the _Normandy's _shuttle pilot, whom they had seen briefly in passing on their way there, and Tara had allowed a particularly flirty young ensign buy her a strong drink.

Ever since she had heard the first rumors of reapers three years ago, her interest had been piqued. It had begun when the geth attacked Eden Prime. If she had known then that Saren's flagship had in fact been one of the beings that Dr. Warren's crazy assistant had raved about… well, she didn't know how that would have changed things, but damn it made her angry to think it had been right under her nose.

Shepard was already a legend – at least on Eden Prime – and when she, too, began to warn against the arrival of the reapers only weeks after the geth attack, Tara had taken notice. That was when she enlisted. And Shepard? Well, Shepard was everything a soldier could aspire to be.

Tara finished her second drink and noticed Shepard nearby, mingling like a pro. Every race that approached her, every rank, station, or gender, got the same warm attention, the same powerful gaze. But it didn't escape her that between each handshake, Shepard's attention was diverted away. Always to the same spot. And finally, as Shepard pulled her focus away to speak with an elcor dignitary, Tara found the recipient of Shepard's singular focus: a turian with blue facial markings, his traditional turian garb bespeaking rank of some sort.

When Shepard stole away with that turian in the thinned crowd a few hours later, Tara smiled to herself, and let out another light chuckle. So those rumors were true, as well.

Shepard was even more of a phenomenon than Tara could have imagined in her wildest dreams. She watched as the icon retreated to solitude with her turian, their arms linked as they took the stairs up towards the presidium apartments. She let the ensign buy her another drink and she danced with him in the thronging crowd of the dance floor. Then, Tara slipped away from the party as well, returning to the _Normandy _in the early hours of the morning_._

She had stowed her meager possessions under a bunk in the crew quarters, but she had forgone the relative comfort of a military issue bed to wander the bowels of the ship, instead. The smooth metal corridors beckoned to her, and she wanted to absorb every piece of this experience.

She was on the _Normandy. _She let that sink in for a moment. The _Normandy_. She was part of a legendary team, and she could only hope that her skills would be a valuable asset to the Commander – _the Captain_ – she corrected herself.

Her wanderings came to an end on the engineering deck. As she stood overlooking the pulsing blue core of the ship, feeling it like a part of her very body with the effects of the alcohol still in her blood, the enormity of it hit her like a biotic shockwave, blasting the breath from her chest.

_Well, shit_, she thought. _I'm going to be pinching myself for weeks._

**Shepard **

She had left the warmth of Garrus's bed in the dark of early morning. She had barely slept a wink, so torn between nerves and excitement. But this insomnia was different from the restlessness and nightmares she had experienced before the battle against the Reapers. This was anticipation. Like the first day of N7 training.

When the first hints of the Citadel's artificial dawn had begun to peek out from the arms of the station, she had roused herself, donning her uniform and planting a kiss firmly on Garrus's forehead.

He had stirred, and a squeeze of her hand had been enough. They had had their fill of goodbyes in the past few years.

Now back on the _Normandy,_ she confirmed that everyone was accounted for and gave Joker the go-ahead. Omega bound.

And Shepard had a good idea of what they might find there.

**Garrus**

He was starting to get into the zone. Sure, it wasn't nearly as _satisfying_ as lining up targets in his scope, but there was something invigorating about the information he was collecting now. He had always preferred the vantage of a sniper, and the data files he was looking over now were providing him with that same perspective.

The chair creaked beneath him as he leaned back, stretching the long muscles of his abdomen.

He checked the digital clock on his datapad. He had scheduled a meeting with the other new councilors, and they would be waiting for him in the conference room.

When he arrived in the conference room, the new asari councilor was already there. She rose, when he entered, and he was immediately struck by her unique look. He had rarely seen an asari whose eyes did not nearly match the cerulean tones of her skin, and this one had rich, dark brown eyes balancing her strong nose and smooth skin.

Her air was commanding, confident. He felt the power of her personality just by the way she assessed him as he entered the room.

"Garrus Vakarian," she remarked. "I have heard a lot about you."

"I'm not sure if that's something I should be pleased to hear," he confessed, bowing his head slightly in a universal gesture of respect and greeting.

She bowed her head back.

"Since everything I've heard has to do with your part in kicking the reapers asses from one side of the galaxy to the other, you have nothing to worry about, Councilor Vakarian," she assured him. "I'm Matriarch Aethyta."

"It's good to meet you," he said, earnestly. He thought he would like this asari. She seemed to be a straight shooter, direct-speaking and forward. And Garrus hated mincing words.

"How is Palaven faring?"

"The fleets have returned and they're aiding with the rebuilding." He sighed: "It won't be easy, but we'll recover. And Thessia?"

She tilted her head, responding thoughtfully: "We have lost much. Culture and relics hold a sacred place in the asari heart. To lose so much history…"

She drifted off, then shook her head, releasing her own sigh.

"We, too, will recover. But we will have to adapt. That is not something the asari were prepared for, and it's not gonna be pretty."

He nodded at that, and felt relief oozing through his veins. He hadn't realized how tense he'd been – how fearful that the other councilors would be unreasonable, short-sighted, thoughtless. He had witnessed enough of Shepard's interactions with the council in the past – including his own councilor, Sparatus, who had been adamant that the reaper story was no more than a conspiracy theory – and he knew that politics could be an ugly, messy world. Matriarch Aethyta, at least, seemed to have her head on straight. He could work with this.

The door hissed open behind them and the remaining half of the council entered the conference room. The human was a petite woman with deep brown skin and dark, short-cropped hair. Her eyes were bright with intelligence and intensity, and a grey streak through her hair bespoke wisdom (or at least that was the convention he had learned from observing human culture.) The salarian was harder to peg. He found it difficult to distinguish them – they were all skinny, nearly vibrating with energy, and spoke so fast his head was always spinning by the time the conversation ended. This one had that same jittery motion, and his skin was tinged slightly green.

"Welcome, Councilors," Garrus said, opening his arms in a gesture of greeting.

The human strode right up to him and shook his hand firmly. His work with C-Sec had introduced him to this custom and he returned it heartily.

"Councilor Vakarian," the woman said. "Sati Rhee, formerly of the Systems Alliance parliament."

He acknowledged her, and she moved to introduce herself to Aethyta. The salarian caught his eyes and nodded.

"Aegohr Marekeis Dalon Rael Chalon Adreon," he said. "Formerly Special Tasks Group. Anxious to start. Current galactic situation… distressing."

The name gave him pause. He half-remembered a conversation he had with Mordin once about salarian culture. To be honest, he hadn't caught the majority of what the scientist had said, and at the time it hadn't concerned him. Mordin had been a rare salarian, in Garrus's opinion. The two had never been on quite the same playing field, but he had respected the geneticist for his obvious genius, straightforward pragmatism and unwavering commitment to his decisions.

Finally, he shook it out from the cobwebs of his mind: the last two names were clan name and given name.

"Thank you for joining us, Councilor Chalon."

Adreon Chalon gave a little shake of impatience – Garrus's moment of drawing a mental blank must have felt like an eternity to the amphibious being with his lightning-fast metabolism.

Above the petite human's head, he cast a humorous glance at Aethyta.

_Riiight, _he thought to himself,_ politics means dealing with… interesting personalities. Perhaps Shepard should have been the one appointed to the council, not me._

He sighed. He hoped Victus has placed his confidence in the right turian.

**Shepard**

As the _Normandy _docked on Omega, Shepard and her team prepared to board. She didn't know if she should expect a violent welcome or an indifferent one, but they were prepared for the worst. Liara was to her right, in full armor, blue biotic sparks releasing intermittently from her fingertips and coiling down her arms. To her left, Whitney stood in silence, his hand hovering near his pistol.

She had decided to bring Whitney along with Liara. Of the two new recruits, he had been the hardest to read, so she hoped that seeing him in action would provide some insights. It helped that his dossier revealed him to be one of the more impressive marksmen that had come through the N7 program in a long time. With his pistol, his sniper rifle, and his technical expertise, she felt comfortable that he and Liara could cover a lot of ground and handle a variety of tactics.

Because if she was honest with herself, she really didn't know what they were walking into, except that there were likely to be mercs, and a lot of them.

"Commander," Joker's voice came over the comm. "We're looking clear to land, but keep your eyes peeled. I don't like how quiet it is."

"Understood, Joker. We're ready to go."

There was a brief pause, and then Joker came back over the comm.

"…yeah, thanks EDI," he was saying. "EDI reminds me that you're _Captain_ now. Damn Alliance, changing things up just when I was getting in a nice, comfortable rut. So yeah. Captain, we're coming in now for the landing."

She chuckled: "All good, Joker. You can still call me _Commander_ if it that suits your sentimental side."

"Right."

She heard the heavy sarcasm in his voice.

"Opening the shuttle bay doors," Joker said.

The doors indeed began to slide open, bringing a rough wind of stale space-station air in to whistle past the armor of the three squad members. With a hand signal and a sharp command into the comm, Shepard sent the team forward towards the open doors, where they leapt onto the dock below.

They landed with three compact _thuds,_ and Shepard glanced around. Nothing.

"No signs of life in the docking bay," Whitney said over the comm, checking a program on his omnitool.

Joker was right. It was too damn quiet. Shepard felt an uneasy flutter in her stomach as she motioned her team forward towards the heavy sliding doors that lead to the bowels of the station.

She didn't like this one bit.

The doors to Omega parted in front of them. The main corridor that led away from the hangar bay was empty, but the sound of distant gunfire echoed somewhere ahead of them. Shepard gestured for Liara to move up ahead and Whitney to take the rear. She saw him switch to his sniper rifle.

_Good,_ she thought. _He's thinking._

They crept along the hall, lining up against the metal walls as they rounded a corner. The gunfire was growing louder.

As they rounded the bend, they ducked behind some ruined storage containers that were strewn across the hall. Just ahead – in their line of sight – a group of mercs were holding out against three monstrous grey and blue beings that looked like something out a nightmare.

"Reaper tech," Shepard spoke quietly into the comm. "I'd bet my life on it."

"What are they?" Liara asked, disgust evident in her voice.

"I have no idea," Shepard replied. "They don't look like any of the races I'm familiar with. Maybe something from a previous cycle that they kept around, just in case."

"Or perhaps this is another Cerberus experiment, like on Sanctuary," Liara suggested.

"Sanctuary?" Whitney chimed in. "Wasn't that a refugee safe haven?"

"Long story," Shepard said. "It was a front for Cerberus to experiment with reaper tech. But I didn't see anything like this when we were there."

She saw Liara shrug in her cover up ahead.

"Okay, first priority: take down those _things. _ Then, we worry about the mercs."

No sooner had she said that than Whitney had lined one up in his sniper rifle, delivering a clean blow to the head. The creature seemed to just shrug it off. Now, Shepard understood why these mercs were looking a little worse for the wear.

Liara followed up Whitney's shot with a singularity, pulling one of the creatures up so Shepard and Whitney could focus their fire. They seemed to be weakening them, but none had dropped yet. Meanwhile, the merc squad was dwindling more by the minute.

One of the terrible, twisted things charged a merc ahead to Shepard's left, making it all the way around his cover and slashing him horribly. Shepard shot an incineration blast at the creature, noting the _bam-BAM_ of Whitney's sniper rifle as he sent another slug into the creature and it finally dropped, sizzling black smoke. The merc collapsed against the cover.

She whipped her attention back to the right, where the two remaining creatures were slowing. Switching to her assault rifle, she sent another incineration blast towards the beasts.

"Oh my God."

She heard the fear in Whitney's voice over the comm. They young man had been cool as a cucumber so far, and she looked up in surprise. And then she saw it.

The merc that they had just saved was writhing, contorting against his cover. His skin darkened and grayed, and she realized –

"He's transforming."

She was surprised at the calm in her own voice over the comm. Before she could aim, Whitney had pumped a sniper round into the chimera and it had dropped, silent. She put another few rounds in it to be safe.

Liara and the mercs had finished off one of the remaining creatures. One remained, and the remaining three mercs, Whitney, Liara, and Shepard all trained their weapons on it. The insistent fire riddled through the monster and it fell. Before it hit the ground, Shepard vaulted over her cover and pulled a powerful pistol from her utility belt. In one swift move, she dove behind a piece of cover that a merc had already claimed, wrapping one arm around his shoulders and drawing the pistol fluidly up to his temple.

"Aria T'Loak," Shepard said calmly. "Where is she?"

* * *

><p>Author's note: There has been some debate as to whether Shepard would be promoted to "major" or "captain." She is a marine, so major would make sense, but she also served directly under Anderson, who was a captain, then an admiral - clearly, naval rankings. I decided to stick with "captain" - artistic decision, I guess. Just so everyone is clear :)<p> 


	8. Omega Is Just Full of Surprises

**Chapter 8: "Omega is just full of surprises"**

**Shepard**

Shepard had recognized the path the mercs were taking her on almost immediately, and as they drew closer to their destination, she felt that certainty growing. Liara and Whitney kept their guns trained on the rest of the mercs, while Shepard held her tight grip on her original hostage, her gun still to his temple. She wanted to dissuade Aria's mercs from using their high ground advantage against her.

As they approached the stronghold, Shepard motioned for her team to stop. The building in front of her loomed, and the memories pushed into her mind.

_They approached the hideout, as sniper rounds dropped mercs at a steady, impressive rate. A concussive round stopped her in her tracks. She saw Miranda and Jacob taking mercs down silently, from behind, and Shepard put a bullet in the back of a merc's head, glancing up at the sniper's perch above._

_Although she could see nothing – the heavy reports of the sniper rounds were her only indication of Archangel's approximate position – she felt certain he saw their actions, and understood: we're on your side._

Shaking the thoughts off, she brought herself back to the present.

"Call her," she told the merc. "Tell her Shepard wants to talk."

The merc called it in, and Shepard saw the wave of gun barrels turn away from her team. They would be allowed to pass in peace. She didn't loosen the pressure of her grip one ounce, guiding the merc up the stairs in front of her.

When they entered the familiar quarters, Aria was standing in the shadows, her arms crossed obstinately. Shepard released her hostage, but kept her pistol out, deliberately keeping the barrel in Aria's general direction.

"Shepard," Aria's voice cut sharply across the space between them. "I wasn't expecting you to take part in my little rescue operation."

"I'm here on a rescue operation of my own, Aria," Shepard replied. "A team of Alliance marines went dark around the time you returned to Omega. You wouldn't happen to know about that, would you?"

Shepard kept her voice even-keeled, but the careful tilt of her head and narrowing of her eyes sent a clear message to Aria: she would tolerate no bullshit.

Aria's face darkened.

"Do I look like I would be in a position to know that?" She spat the confession out. "This place was crawling with Cerberus and their _adjutants_ the moment we returned to reclaim what was ours. That Illusive bastard must have had a damn good succession plan – the reapers didn't even phase them."

"So those… things," Liara interjected. "They're really Cerberus's creations?"

"Yes. Cerberus's latest monstrosity," Aria snapped, "They unleashed them on Omega and they tore the place to pieces and forced me out."

Aria scoffed and crossed her arms over her chest. She observed her three guests, disdain evident in her features.

"I thought Cerberus would have cleaned up their own mess by the time I had returned, but these things seem to be multiplying. And now Cerberus is back. I've seen their troopers sneaking around my station, and I intend to do something about it."

Shepard thought for a moment, absorbing the information: not just Aria's words, but the slight flare of her nostrils that betrayed her desperation. She was telling the truth – or at least giving Shepard an honest opinion. She wanted her station back, and instead she'd ended up holed up in a hideout while hideous beasts and human supremacists wrecked the only thing that really meant anything to her.

"What do you know about the Cerberus team you've encountered?" Shepard asked, probing for the bigger picture.

The largest piece of this jigsaw was the Cerberus involvement. Like Aria, Shepard had assumed that Cerberus would be at worst a fragmented, ineffectual ghost of itself as it regrouped following the fall of the Illusive Man. And at best, it would be totally destroyed by the loss of its leader. Encountering what Aria claimed to be a powerful, organized Cerberus force commanding not only shock troopers but more of Cerberus's terrible reaper-based genetic experiments was something Shepard had not been prepared for.

And that nagged at her.

"We've identified what seems to be their headquarters," Aria explained. "We believe that whoever is leading the squad is issuing orders from an apartment located in the Gozu District. I've sent infiltration squads in, but Cerberus is packing some very heavy firepower. No one has gotten through."

"But you can identify the exact apartment?"

"Yes," Aria said, a question in her word.

"I know a thing or two about Cerberus," Shepard said. "If I can get in and capture their leader, I want two things. One: I want access to the leader. Cerberus may have been involved in the disappearance of the Alliance marines we're looking for. "

She paused, locking eyes with Aria, who nodded in agreement. Shepard continued:

"And two: I want access to the station, and assistance from your mercs. If that team is still on Omega, I need free reign to track them down."

"Done," Aria said easily. "But Shepard, _I want my station back_."

Shepard nodded. Omega had a long tradition of being outside the reach of the law. The council had always allowed Aria to go about her business of chaos without intervention. Until the council changed their minds, Shepard was similarly content to let the scum of the galaxy gravitate to Omega.

_Granted, we saw what happened last time someone tried to eliminate the filth in this hive of villainy._

With that thought, she felt her gaze drawn to the spot where Garrus had lain, spilling blue blood at an alarming rate.

_Garrus scrambled behind cover as the gunship let loose a volley of machine gun fire. The fire subsided, and Shepard saw the quick twitch of his muscles as he sprang from cover, intending to cross the deadly gap between himself and a better position. He moved at the same moment the ship did. The ship released a rocket at the turian and slammed him into the ground with a sickening sound._

_Shepard felt a terrible surge and her vision sharpened, focused on the gunship. She let loose with everything in her arsenal, aiming her rage with a single-minded focus until the ship spun out, crashing to the ground in a mighty fireball. She leapt her cover, sliding across the slick floor to Garrus's side._

_When he drew a sudden, ragged breath, she felt her heart beat again. His hand curled around his rifle and he looked up at her, his eyes holding desperately onto her, as if a break in his focus would send him falling away from here. _

"_We're getting you out of here, Garrus," she said, suppressing a sickened feeling in her gut at the dreadful, wet, gurgling sound of his breath. "Just hold on."_

Now, the floor there was grey and grimy, but held no signs of the thick, blue blood that had pooled between the cracks of the tile. She snapped her attention back to Aria.

"Tell me where this apartment is."

**Tara**

It irked her that Shepard had not brought her on this mission. She was itching to show what she was capable of, and wanted to see some action. She had never been one for sitting still.

So this was the last thing she wanted to be doing right now. She shuffled the cards in her hand, dealing them out onto the mess hall table into a single-player game appropriately titled "Citadel." She flicked the cards lazily – an available two to its matching ace. She moved a six to free up another two.

At least it gave her mind something to do.

On the other side of the table, a young woman with dark hair sat, picking at a plate of military-issue pasta. From the look on the woman's face as she chewed, it was just as tasteless as Tara remembered from her last deployment.

She freed up a three from one of the rows of cards and placed it atop its corresponding two. She let out a sigh, taking a sip of her coffee.

Just then, the silver mech she had seen the other day rounded the corner from the elevator and strode to the kitchen. She had dismissed this curvaceous, metallic being as simply a personification of a male fantasy, no doubt designed as a VI platform by a lonely – again, _male _– engineer.

But despite her scorn, she was curious. She had seen this robot holding hands with the pilot when they had been off duty in the mess hall. And Shepard had said of Joker: "only his girlfriend calls him Jeff." Was the mech his girlfriend?

She decided to find out.

"Hey," she said, leaning in towards the young woman at the table to get her attention.

"Can I ask you a question?" Tara asked.

"Of course," the woman said in a clipped English accent. "I can't promise I'll be able to answer it."

"The mech. Is she…. _dating_ the pilot?"

A mischievous grin spread across the woman's face.

"Why don't you ask her yourself?"

Tara looked back to find the mech standing just beside her, a steaming mug of coffee in her metallic hands.

The machine tilted her head, clearly a mimicry of a questioning look. It was unnerving.

"You wish to inquire about my relationship with Jeff, Lieutenant Ness?"

_God, it's so good at the inflection. It actually sounds human. _Tara thought. A little realization started to assert itself in the back of her mind.

Caught, she had no way to go but forward, so she asked:

"Yes. Are you a couple?"

"Yes," the mech responded. "We have been engaging in courtship practices for some time now."

Tara appraised the machine in front of her. She may not be an expert in virtual intelligence, but she was no idiot:

"There's no way you're just a VI," Tara declared, leaning back in her chair and crossing her arms.

"That is correct. I am an unshackled artificial intelligence," the mech – _the AI_ – said. "But I prefer 'EDI.'"

EDI shifted, mimicking Tara's stance exactly. Tara wondered if it – _she – _knew the psychological implications of that mimicry. She seemed highly informed about organic behavior.

"Shit," Tara said, drawing out the word in amazement. "Shepard really does run things differently."

"Captain Shepard is an excellent leader," the AI said. "I have learned much from her."

Tara had no clue what to make of this. God damn, this place was more interesting than anywhere she had ever been. Who knew the Alliance was actually a little deviant under all the protocol?

Or perhaps, they were just willing to tolerate a little unconventionality from the galaxy's wunderkind. Either way, Tara had never been more pleased with a ship assignment in her three years of employment with the Alliance.

"I do not wish to be rude, but I had promised Jeff I would bring him a cup of coffee," EDI said, excusing herself and crossing the mess hall for the elevator.

Tara watched her go, stunned and fascinated.

"She's quite something, isn't she?" the young woman spoke up.

"Yeah," Tara said. "Shepard's something else, alright."

"Oh, I meant EDI," the woman said, tucking her dark hair behind her ear.

"Oh."

The woman extended her hand: "I'm Specialist Samantha Traynor."

"Lieutenant Tara Ness," Tara said, shaking her hand. It was soft – this was not a woman cut for battle.

"I could use a drink," Tara said suddenly.

"There's a rec room just down the hall from the elevator. Bar's usually stocked. Just make sure you check the labels – there's both dextro and levo. You wouldn't want to pick the wrong liquor."

"That would be one hell of a hangover, huh?"

Traynor giggled, returning to her lunch. Tara felt herself smile, in spite of herself. She may not be on Omega, but she was discovering that the _Normandy_ was just as entertaining as a firefight.

But she was definitely going to go get a drink. Maybe that would counteract the spinning in her head.

**Shepard**

When Aria had uploaded the location of the apartment to Shepard's omni-tool, Shepard, Liara, and Whitney left Aria's hideout, headed for the Gozu district. The narrow alleys of Omega were eerily hushed, and Shepard warned her team to be on guard. They knew the station was crawling with adjutants and Cerberus, and Shepard wasn't sure which one sent the greater chill down her spine.

She had told herself time and again that her brief partnership with Cerberus was just another part of that ruthless calculus. _Whatever it takes_. But she couldn't quite shake the fear that she had legitimized them, given them exactly what they'd wanted. With Kai Leng and the Illusive Man both dead, she had no idea who was behind the wheel, so to speak. And that was the worst. Cerberus used to be a known quantity. She could at least read the Illusive Man, understand his actions, his twisted logic.

A loud crash came from up ahead, and two adjutants tore out of a door and rushed down the alleyway right at them.

"Liara, singularity!" Shepard shouted, letting out a sharp volley from her assault rifle.

The flickering, blue-black warp in space-time arose in front of the beasts, drawing both of them in with its heavy pull. Shepard registered the loud report of a sniper rifle and noted Whitney's location – he had fallen back and was using the powerful rifle to weaken them as they hung suspended.

Shepard punctuated her assault rifle bursts with incineration plasma rounds from her omni-tool. The adrenaline had kicked up and she felt her moves grow swifter, more powerful. And it was just so damn _satisfying_ to see one of those terrible mutant things go up in flames.

The singularity vanished, and the two adjutants dropped to the floor and scrambled to their feet. To her left, she saw Whitney exchange his sniper rifle for a pistol with a damage mod. _Good._ To her left, Liara dove to cover further to the side, flanking the adjutants and sending out a powerful warp field, covering herself with shots from her pistol.

Shepard tapped her omni-tool, cloaking herself, and stood boldly, holding her assault rifle in both hands, blasting into the creatures. One dropped. Her cloak wouldn't last much longer, but she still had the element of surprise.

The remaining creature was nearly upon her, and Shepard holstered her gun, sprinting forwards. With a powerful leap, she propelled herself, still invisible, into it. A brutal melee dropped it to the ground, and she pulled out her pistol whip-fast and shot the final monster point-blank in the head.

It dropped with a gurgle and a thud, and Shepard's cloak flickered away.

Whitney stared at her, eyes wide. Her sharp hearing – it was good for a human, but couldn't hold a candle to turian hearing, as Garrus often gleefully reminded her – picked up the faint swear under his breath. She caught the new recruit's gaze and gave him a nod.

"Nice work," she said.

"These all used to be… people."

Liara had pulled herself up from her cover and was examining the bodies. Her voice drew Shepard's attention back to the carnage they had left in their wake. Her stomach turned – not at the viscera, but at the gentle reminder from Liara that these creatures had died twice.

"Omega is full of surprises. It seems like every time we come back here, they have a nasty new present for us," Shepard said. "If Cerberus is behind this, well…" she paused, considering her thoughts, "I just hope they don't have any other secret experiments. I think we've come across enough destruction and manipulation to last another reaper cycle."

She adjusted her grip on her pistol and turned her attention forward.

"Let's keep going," she said.

"Hopefully, we can get to that apartment before we run into any more of those things," Liara agreed.

"Or Cerberus troops," Whitney added.

"A little variety makes things interesting," Shepard joked.

The adrenaline was starting to settle back to its normal levels, but she still felt that strange detachment that had often led to banter on the battlefield. Whitney seemed to take it in stride.

_You never know when you're going to get one who gets offended, _she mused._ This is life for us. You won't survive if you can't find a way to work some humor out of it._

They crept forward, sticking conservatively to cover when they could. The adjutants were like husks in their single-minded advance, but a hell of a lot tougher. And Shepard shuddered to think of what would happen if they managed to infect her or one of her team. She hoped that was one piece of knowledge they wouldn't be learning by experience.

Finally, in the heart of the Gozu district, they came across what was without a doubt the Cerberus stronghold. Shepard peered around a corner and spotted a staircase that was dotted with generated shields, each shield protecting a handful of Cerberus troops.

"Bingo," she muttered.

She pressed herself back against the wall, turning to Liara and Whitney.

"We've got Cerberus troops. They have the higher ground, but not by much. There's some cover to the left – some storage containers and debris. I doubt they'll hold out for long, so be ready to move quickly."

They both nodded.

"Okay," Shepard said. "Everybody in."

She cloaked, pulling her sniper rifle from her back and dashing around the corner and to the left. She selected the furthest piece of cover and ducked behind it as she watched Liara and Whitney dive behind their own cover up ahead. And then she started lining up shots.

After the second Cerberus trooper went down from her headshot, she noticed one of them disappear into one of the apartments on the upper level. No doubt they were warning their leader. She focused her attention back in on the Cerberus troops swarming the stairs. She took out a shield generator and watched as Liara ripped the soldiers behind it with a warp.

She hurled herself over the storage box and ducked behind the mangled remains of a Cerberus atlas.

She switched to her assault rifle and shot an incineration around the cover, hearing it land with a sizzle. She popped out, taking aim.

A familiar voice interrupted her focus. Its clipped, Australian accent rang out through the narrow metallic hall.

"Cease fire!"

The Cerberus troops ceased immediately, responding to the authority in the voice. Shepard peered out from behind the Atlas and noted how Liara immediately lowered her own weapon. Shepard glanced over at Whitney.

"Lieutenant, put that weapon away. She's a friend."

She stepped out of cover, crossing her arms as she made eye contact with the icy blue gaze of her evasive former XO.

"Miranda," she said, hearing the wonder in her own voice. "What the hell are you doing here?"


	9. Diplomacy

Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who has read, favorite-ed, and reviewed. I'm not a writer who likes to ask for reviews, but I also don't want you to think they aren't appreciated - they are! Thanks again to CyberianTsuinami for beta-ing, and the most important thanks, which I have been remiss for not mentioning before, goes to Bioware for creating this universe. They own these characters, I just get to play with them from time to time (no, get your minds out of the gutter...).

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><p><strong>Chapter 9: "Diplomacy"<strong>

**Garrus**

Was he losing his mind or did his desk get less comfortable each day? When he had started this job a scant few days ago, he had noted the way the chair gave slightly against him when he sat. He remembered thinking that relative to the C-Sec cubicles, this was very nice. Now, he shifted uncomfortably.

It's not that he had low tolerance for discomfort. He was a soldier, after all. But the sort of discomfort he experienced in the field was very different from this. The near-direct contact of his body with the furniture was unfamiliar to him. It had been over two years since C-Sec, and in that time, he'd realized he was suited to the active life of a vigilante and military official. His civilian clothing was merely decoration, and he missed the way his armor had contained and cushioned him from external contact.

_Well, that's one for the head doctors,_ he thought. _I'll keep that one to myself. _

He had always managed to avoid the bulk of Kelly Chambers' questions aboard the Cerberus-crewed Normandy the year before. He was proud of that accomplishment. His problems were his own – he didn't need anyone else in his head. The only person he had ever let get close was Shepard, and really, she had done that without his even noticing. Just walked her way on in and sat down to make herself comfortable.

A smile spread across his mandibles at the image that arose in his mind at that.

And then that spirits-damned chair. It poked at his hips and poked into his thoughts. It must still be adjusted to Sparatus. Perhaps it could be adjusted, unlike the cheap C-Sec desk he had worked at for years… He stood suddenly, kneeling beside the chair and fiddling with it, wishing that office equipment could be calibrated like the Thanix cannon. He didn't know what to do with all these manual adjustors.

The door whirred open and a young, female turian walked in. He started, confused by her presence and embarrassed that she had walked in to find him on the ground, fiddling with his chair. He imagined he was supposed to put forward a rather more dignified impression, now that he was the councilor.

And then he realized he had no idea who she was.

"Councilor Vakarian?" she asked, her flanged voice soft and controlled. She bowed to him.

"Yes? Who are you?" he asked.

She shifted uncomfortably and he cringed at his own abruptness.

_Nice, Vakarian. Good people skills. You've got this politician thing down._

"Teanna Massius. I'm your secretary. I'm sorry I only just started today – my transport from Digeris was delayed."

He rose, dusting his legs off, and straightened himself out. He wanted to apologize, but found the words catching in his throat – something that happened all too often. Words were not his thing.

"Of course," he said. "Not a problem… uh… hmm. Welcome."

He had never had a secretary before. What was the protocol for this? Was he supposed to give her something to do? He didn't know what he needed a secretary for.

"Thank you," she said. "Is there anything I can help you with?"

"Ah… no. I think I've got everything under control," he said.

"Your chair?" She asked, stepping forward and gesturing towards the offending piece of furniture.

"Oh that?" Garrus turned, contemplating the predicament he'd found himself in earlier. "No, I'm fine. Just… fiddling with it."

"Oh," she said.

There was a long pause. Garrus shifted uncomfortably.

"I'll be outside at my desk if you need anything, councilor," she said, leaving the room.

When the doors shut behind her, Garrus took a seat at his desk again, his head in his hands.

_This was a lot to get used to._

**Tali**

The first thing she noticed when she woke was that her suit was different. It felt – stiffer. And it smelled different, brushed against her skin with a different texture, filtered the sound waves of the external world with a slightly different timbre.

The next thing she noticed was the throbbing in her head and the flushed feeling in her body. She had a fever, that was for sure, and from the way her head was protesting, it had been a much worse fever not long before. She pushed herself up, groaning as her head swam in the murky waters of her pain.

She glanced down at her knees – yes, her suit was new. What had happened to her old one? She'd had that suit for years, and felt a pang at the unfamiliar sight of her own body.

A familiar, throaty voice broke through her consciousness, and she felt the pressure of two hands supporting her as she sat up.

"Slowly, Tali," the voice chided gently. "How are you feeling?"

She turned to look at the figure next to her in her dark suit with the silver lines running through it.

"Auntie Raan?" she asked. "Where am I?"

"We are still on earth," Raan said. "The _Tonbay_ is waiting in orbit to return to Rannoch. Most of our people have already returned."

_Rannoch._ She could hardly believe it, still. Their homeworld.

"Where is Shepard?"

It was the next question that sprung to mind, and she blurted it out. Raan chuckled quietly, the modulated sound comforting to Tali.

"The Commander was called away on a mission, but she insisted that I remain here with you. I told her that her insistence was unnecessary. I would not dream of leaving you here alone."

She took a moment, orienting herself. Her omni-tool lay on the table beside her hospital bed and she snatched it up, attaching it to her new suit and opening the messaging system. She spoke as she typed:

"What is the status of the flotilla?"

"We lost a few ships," Raan admitted, "but once the Crucible was activated, we suffered only minor damage. I'll send a complete list of casualties to you. The rest of the flotilla has already arrived on Rannoch, aside from the _Tonbay_ and a small escort."

"I can't believe it," Tali said, pausing her typing. She was drafting a short message to Shepard.

"No one can," Raan said, wonder in her voice.

Tali sent off the message, and scanned her inbox. There was the update from Raan, as promised, and a number of messages from officials that had remained on Rannoch. She would address those as soon as she was on the Tonbay, heading home.

_Home_, she thought. _Rannoch is home now. _

The life of a nomad precludes attachment to particular locations, but for the past three years, she had found a place that had felt like home. The _Normandy_. And now, Rannoch awaited. With her little plot of land, ready to build a home where she could watch the rising of Tikkun in the morning.

"Let's go," she said to Raan, kicking her legs over the side of the bed and preparing to leave.

Raan reached out to steady her as she felt wooziness take over.

"Slow down, Tali," Raan said. "Let the doctors take a look at you before we rush away. You've been here a while."

"How long?" she asked, suddenly very aware of her absence from the conscious world.

"Nearly two weeks."

Tali's reply was a horrified squawk:

"What?"

**Garrus**

The four councilors stood behind their podiums, awaiting their next hearing of the day. They had all been briefed that morning, but Garrus checked the datapad on his podium quickly to see what came next on the agenda.

"Connect the krogan representative," Aethyta said to the assistant who was operating the vidcom.

_Ah, right, _Garrus thought to himself. _The krogan have a proposition to submit to the council. This should be interesting._

The hologram flickered to life in front of him. A krogan female, modestly covered in embroidered cloth. He realized with a small grin that this was not just any female krogan. It was Eve.

"Urdnot Bakara," the salarian councilor said. "What is your proposal?"

The krogan surveyed each councilor with her slow, wise gaze. When her eyes landed on Garrus, she nodded slightly to him, and he nodded back.

"The krogan people have sacrificed many in the fight to defeat the reapers, at a time when we were already weakened greatly in numbers. We ask that our sacrifice be recognized, and our role as leaders in the galaxy be accepted," Bakara spoke in her low, gravelly voice, looking each councilor in the eyes in turn.

"Genophage cure synthesized and distributed. Reward for service already given. Demanded, actually," Chalon scoffed.

"The cure was reparation for damage done centuries ago. The krogan have showed ourselves to be capable and powerful. A seat on the council is proper recognition of the role we have graduated to," she continued, steadily.

"Bakara is right," Garrus said. "With Wrex in charge, the krogan are on a path to stability and peace with the galaxy."

Aethyta chimed in, backing him: "More than that, they have shown themselves willing to work with the other races to defeat a mutual threat. Their sacrifice was greater than most, even though Tuchanka itself was barely touched by the reapers."

The human councilor crossed her arms, her expression indignant.

_I'm familiar with that one, _Garrus thought with wry humor. _It's one of Shepard's favorites._

"Tuchanka was already a bombed-out crater, thanks to damage the krogan had inflicted on themselves," she said, derision in her voice.

"We have a history just as marred with tragedy and violence as all the rest of you," Bakara said calmly, though Garrus detected a lilt of humor in that dry voice. "The humans killed and enslaved their own kind for millennia and had barely been a unified force for one hundred years when they got their seat on the council. Still, they are tarnished by human supremacy groups committing acts of terrorism. One of these even collaborated with the reapers."

Sati Rhee shifted uncomfortably at that, Garrus noted with a smile, and then Bakara turned towards him.

"The turians fought one of the bloodiest inter-planetary wars in the galaxy's history against other tribes of their own nation," Bakara said.

Garrus accepted the criticism. The Unification War was a dark spot in turian history, but he acknowledged that it had made them the race they were today. Bakara did not linger on him, he noticed. She knew he was not the adversary in this situation.

"And the salarians have their own offshoot that they have tried to disown. They disavow the actions of the Lystheni every time they reappear in galactic news, but the salarians engage in deception and trickery even in the mainstream. Most recently, Dalatrass Linron attempted to bribe a spectre to sabotage the genophage cure, despite the agreement that the turians reached with the krogan."

Chalon spluttered something about "nonsense" at those words, but the way Sati and Aethyta were staring at him, Garrus knew that the denials would fall on deaf ears.

Bakara turned her attention to Aethyta: "And while the asari people's commitment to philosophy and diplomacy is admirable, it can lead to a failure to act when it is most necessary. The asari were the last to come to the aid of the galaxy against the reaper threat, waiting until Thessia was on death's door and they could deny it no more."

Garrus saw the fire in Aethyta's brown eyes, but sensed that anger was directed at her own people, and not at the krogan shaman in front of her. Yes, he would like this asari.

Bakara was waiting, letting her words sink in. Her hologram flickered briefly, but her gaze remained steady.

Chalon was the first to speak:

"Krogan membership in the council unadvisable. Dangerous. Who knows what havoc they will wreak even without a council vote?"

Garrus saw the thunder in Bakara's face, but unlike Wrex, she showed restraint. That woman was a born politician.

_I hope Wrex knows how good he's got it, _Garrus thought. _Wrex may be able to unite the krogan, but Eve can rally the galaxy to them._

Aethyta shot back at Chalon:

"The krogan have earned a chance at our trust."

Councilor Rhee spoke up then, her voice wavering slightly as all eyes came to focus on her.

"They only helped the turians on the condition that the genophage was cured. They did nothing until the cure was dispersed. That's hardly an act that should earn our trust."

"The genophage was a horror that never should have been loosed on them in the first place!"

Garrus was surprised at the passion in his own voice. Three years ago, as a naïve C-Sec official, he had believed with all his heart that the genophage was necessary. Meeting Wrex – then Grunt and Bakara – had changed his sentiments entirely. The krogans had been a young race – naturally hotheaded, and their technology artificially accelerated by the salarians.

He wondered sometimes now how the turians would have turned out if someone had handed them a nuclear bomb while they were still primitive, tribal people. Not well, he imagined.

Aethyta was observing him with a triumphant smile. Sati looked uncomfortable, and Adreon infuriated.

Garrus calmed himself, rubbing his tired eyes with the back of his hands.

Sati spoke up then:

"I propose that the council adjourn for discussion. We can return with our decision once we have examined this thoroughly."

"Seconded," Garrus said wearily.

This was going to take a while.

**Shepard**

Miranda regarded Shepard with her usual calm gaze, her hand resting jauntily on her hip. They were inside the main room of the apartment that was currently serving as Cerberus's base of operations on Omega. It was spartan and efficient – equipment was set up neatly atop storage crates, and a pristine weapons bench in the corner was currently a hum of activity as Cerberus troops restocked.

Liara and Whitney stood at Shepard's side, their stances more relaxed and their weapons stowed, though Whitney cast an occasional worried glance at the Cerberus troops walking around.

"I didn't realize how quickly the adjutants were multiplying. This was all work the Illusive Man started with my father, so it was after I resigned from Cerberus," Miranda explained to Shepard. "When the reapers were destroyed, I figured that was the best time to get back to Cronos Station and fill the vacuum before someone else could. The first stop after that was Omega, to clean up the rest of my father's mess."

She spit out those last words and her nose wrinkled like she had a bitter taste in her mouth.

"How long have you been here?"

"Just under a week, now. There was already a small platoon of Cerberus troops and mechs holed away in this apartment. I brought reinforcements with me. And then we ran into Aria and her mercs."

"And Aria wasn't too thrilled to see Cerberus here," Shepard finished.

"Exactly," Miranda said, but by the way her blue eyes flashed, Shepard knew that Miranda had been none to pleased to encounter the asari criminal and self-proclaimed queen of Omega herself.

Shepard sighed. This was not the time for Aria and Miranda to be fighting each other – the adjutants were a much bigger worry – but she knew that getting them to agree to work together would be a struggle. Particularly for Aria. Her hatred for Cerberus had been festering during her exile from Omega, and Shepard wondered if it might just be incurable.

"Miranda," Shepard said, leaning in close and speaking under her breath. "I need something from you, first. It's sensitive, and I hope you will do this for me. Before you took charge of Cerberus, the Alliance had a black ops team on Omega. They infiltrated Cerberus and went dark a few days ago."

Miranda shifted, standing up straighter and crossing her arms, her cool gaze still inscrutable. Shepard continued, knowing her own calm tone and placid expression to be equally unreadable:

"I understand you probably have concerns about security and loyalty. I can take the team off your hands. With all your help on earth, I'm confident I can persuade the Alliance to back off Cerberus now that you have the reins. It's in their best interest that you maintain power. They wouldn't want Cerberus to fall into less sympathetic hands."

Miranda considered this for a moment. Shepard wondered what exactly was running through her head. She had been a tough nut to crack, and one of the last people that Shepard had won over when she had been on the Cerberus-controlled _Normandy_. Miranda's resignation from Cerberus had been almost a surprise to Shepard.

Much went on in this woman's head and she played her cards close to her chest – something Shepard admired, but it did put a strange buffer between them.

"Do you have any information on this team?"

Shepard pulled up the data on her omni-tool, editing out the dossiers Hackett had forwarded her until all that remained were the names and faces of the missing team. She sent that data to Miranda's omni-tool. Her former XO looked it over quickly, efficiently.

"Some of these men I've never seen before, so I can't tell you what happened to them, but a few of them were with the Cerberus team I found when I arrived in Omega. Two of them are in the back room – they've got next shift outside. The third was outside when you arrived. I imagine he's still out there."

"Thank you, Miranda."

She nodded.

"Shepard," she said, "I want to rebuild Cerberus; make it a force for good in the galaxy. We have resources, technology, troops, but – "

"You have a PR nightmare on your hands," Shepard finished her sentence. "Let me handle that, Miranda. Right now, we need those resources to defend Omega."

Miranda brought up a map of the station on her omni-tool, projecting it on the nearby wall.

"The adjutants are spread out across the station. That is the one advantage we have: they are not coordinated. They're not intelligent enough for that, so instead they're scattered. There are small pockets of civilians in hiding, but they are few and far between. The adjutants are powerful, and once they get their hands on you, so to speak…"

"Yeah, we saw it happen to one of Aria's mercs. Not pretty."

"No," Miranda's agreement was grim, her lips pressed into a thin line. She continued: "I've mapped out known areas with larger adjutant populations. We can't take them all on together, so our strategy has been to isolate them, pull a few away with mechs so we can manage them. But we don't have the numbers we need. They're strong."

"So with more troops, you could fight them off?" Shepard asked.

"Yes," Miranda said. "I've called in another unit of Cerberus troops, but our forces were greatly weakened with that mess on Sanctuary, not to mention the troops the Illusive Man lost when he attacked the Citadel. We can get back off the ground, but right now our numbers are low."

She flicked over to a new map, which showed three circled corridors.

"Once our troops arrive, we may be able to tackle the rest of the areas, but for now, these are our focus. Once they get here… I don't know if we'll be able to finish them off, but at least I'll have more pieces on the board."

"What if you had the Blue Suns, Eclipse, and the Blood Pack to back you up?"

"That would help," Miranda mused, "but they'd never work with us."

"Do you need Omega, Miranda?" Shepard said abruptly.

"Why?" she asked. "What did you have in mind?"

"I can help you with Cerberus's image, and with the Alliance's policies towards you," she said, "But I've got Aria breathing down my neck to get Cerberus off this station. I may be able to convince her to help you – but she won't back down until she gets Omega."

Miranda contemplated this, crossing her arms. Shepard knew that she wanted to prove herself as a leader to her people, but also that Miranda was smart, resourceful, and wanted to rehabilitate Cerberus more than she wanted power for herself. She had grown in the year Shepard had known her.

"I did always say this place was a pisshole," Miranda finally said, a ghost of a grin playing at the corners of her mouth.

Shepard smiled.


	10. Uneasy Peace

**Chapter 10: "Uneasy Peace"**

**Shepard**

She knew waltzing into Aria's hideout with the leader of Cerberus in tow was not the most tactful way of getting this negotiation started, but she had always preferred being direct to circuitous maneuvering. Besides, Aria was in a tight spot, and Miranda had agreed to leave the platoon of troops in their headquarters.

_We come in peace, _she thought wryly.

The mercs escorted them across the bridge into the building.

"Interesting choice of hideout," Miranda muttered.

Shepard just nodded, not sure what to say.

Once inside, Aria approached them.

"Bringing Cerberus to the party, Shepard?" she asked acerbically.

At her gesture, two bodyguards leveled their guns at Miranda's head, and in the same instant, Miranda pulled her own gun. The room was filled with the rustling of metal on metal as the mercs surrounding them all trained their own weapons on the small team.

Shepard stepped between Miranda and Aria, raising her hands in a gesture of peace. Whitney and Liara flanked her, their weapons out and readied, but carefully pointed at the floor. A heavy silence filled the room. Fingers trembled a hair's breadth from their triggers.

Miranda and Aria scowled darkly at each other over Shepard's shoulder, not budging from their aggressive stances.

"Aria."

Shepard's voice cut through the room. Her arms still raised, she tried to make eye contact with Aria, but the asari wouldn't look away from her target.

"Aria," Shepard said again. "She's with me. She's agreed to leave Omega, if you will help to clear the adjutants out."

"Right," Aria sneered, her voice seething and acidic. "Cerberus wants me to help them destroy their own little pets."

"They're not our pets," Miranda snapped. "Cerberus is under new leadership, now. What the Illusive Man did before was regrettable. I intend to put it right."

"Shepard, I never knew you to be gullible," Aria scoffed. "But that bullshit stinks worse than anything I've smelled this side of the Attican Traverse."

"Miranda is trustworthy," Shepard urged. "She left Cerberus because of the lines the Illusive Man crossed, and now that he's dead, she's the only person we want in charge of Cerberus, because she's the only person who can put it right."

"Why should I believe you?" Aria said, her voice cold. "What's in it for me to not shoot her between the eyes right now?"

"Omega," Shepard said. "Aria, Cerberus doesn't want Omega. Miranda is responsible for ending Cerberus's experiments on Sanctuary, and she just wants to end what happened here. Once we've destroyed the adjutants, she's agreed to leave for good."

Aria studied Shepard, her eyebrow raised as she calculated, measured Miranda up. Measured _Shepard_ up.

"Not a single Cerberus troop. Not a single Cerberus ship," she said. "I want them to swear they will never set foot on Omega again. And Shepard, I will hold you _personally responsible_ for making sure they keep their word."

"We'll be gone. Permanently," Miranda said. "We want to have nothing to do with Omega."

"Well, I want to have nothing to do with _you_!" Aria sneered.

A silence. Shepard felt the tension slowly bleed out, until finally Aria nodded, and with a chorus of clicks the guns were stowed.

"Let's get these fuckers off my station."

**Garrus **

"Can we find a compromise on this?" he asked his fellow councilors.

Really, this had gone on far too long. They had argued for hours, recessed briefly for a long-overdue meal, and rejoined to fire up the debate again in a private conference room. Garrus was antsy – he paced a corner of the room while the rest of the councilors sat at the table.

Adreon scoffed and Sati fidgeted. She seemed to be trying to walk a fine line, and it frustrated him that she was still so hesitant to admit that the krogan deserved some credit for what they had done.

Aethyta had been watching him, her eyes contemplative. She finally spoke up.

"A partial council position," she suggested suddenly. "Half a vote, on a probationary period. They get a chance to prove themselves, and we get a chance to boot them out if they screw up."

"Absurd. Unheard of in entirety of galactic history," Adreon spoke up, an edge to his voice.

Garrus looked over to the human councilor, gauging her reaction. She appeared to be chewing on one of her fingers, a habit he found bewildering and disgusting. Shepard never did that. He would have to ask her about it.

Suddenly, Sati straightened and dropped her hands to her side.

"Half a vote might still give them the ability to break a tied vote," she said. "That's a lot of power."

"True," Garrus mused.

Sati continued: "We could stipulate that a tie must be broken by a full vote. That would leave us more or less where we are now."

Aethyta was nodding. Adreon had crossed his skinny arms over his concave abdominal cavity, his eyes narrowed.

"Quarians and geth also contributed. Are we proposing a geth council seat?" He spat the words.

A silence spread across the room as the councilors considered his point. Surely, the quarians and geth had contributed greatly to the war, but could they afford to nearly double the council's size? For more than a millennium, it had been just the salarians and asari. Then the turians received a seat and hundreds of years passed before the humans finally joined.

"The galaxy is changing quickly," Garrus said aloud.

Sati nodded.

"The reapers kicked all our asses into gear," Aethyta said. "We can't just pretend things will go back to the way they have always been."

"We can deal with the quarian and geth issue later. Right now, we are considering the krogan request. I second Councilor Rhee's suggestion," Garrus said. "The krogan will receive a probationary council seat. Half a vote for a period of twenty years?"

Adreon scoffed: "Twenty years may be long to a turian," he exclaimed, gesticulating wildly with his arms. "Not to a krogan, or an asari. Hasty."

Aethyta chimed in: "One hundred years."

"Agreed," Sati said.

"Agreed," Garrus added.

They all looked to Adreon, who re-crossed his arms, glaring.

"Not agreed," he said firmly.

_Stubborn bastard,_ Garrus thought. Normally that was something he would admire, but in this case, it was just annoying.

Aethyta stood.

"We have a verdict to announce," she said, waving to one of the aides in the room.

The aide set up the holographic connection, and soon Bakara flickered into the room. The councilors all faced her and Aethyta announced the decision:

"The vote stands three to one. The krogan will become council members for the probationary period of one century, with half a vote and no tie-breaking privileges. At the end of their probation, provided they have met the council's standards, they will receive full membership."

He could not see her mouth behind her veil, but from the way the corners of her eyes crinkled, Garrus was pretty confident that Bakara was smiling.

"The representative for the krogan accepts the council's ruling. We will nominate a councilor to report to the Citadel within the week," she said.

Garrus realized suddenly that this would involve a whole lot of paperwork.

**Shepard**

They hit the adjutant strongholds in three teams. Miranda led a Cerberus strike team. Aria led her own team of mercs. And Shepard and her team were accompanied by a joint force of Cerberus and merc troops.

"I guess we're the new global peacemakers," Liara marveled, looking at the mixed group behind them.

"And that's new how?" Shepard asked with a smirk.

Liara chuckled, "I suppose it's not."

"I've got something at my two," Whitney broke in. "Movement. Might be adjutants."

"Understood," Shepard said, pointing the barrel of her assault rifle where Whitney had indicated. "We have possible contact with group A," Shepard said into her comm. "Status?"

"We're nearing their last known location of group C," Miranda's voice crackled into her headset. "No sight yet, but my sensors are reading activity ahead."

"And group B?" Shepard asked.

"Nothing yet," Aria said. "Are you sure about your coordinates, princess?"

"Positive," Miranda snapped. "Of course, they do _move_. They're alive, after all. We had a scout report a sighting at the coordinates I sent you this morning. Same location the day before. And the day before. Shall I continue?"

"No," Aria said coldly.

"Alright, you two," Shepard said. "We're moving in to take out group A."

"Understood," Miranda replied crisply.

Shepard gave the hand motions to her team and they slipped forward, ready to attack in unison.

As they rounded a corner, the adjutants came into view. Three of them, roaming about, seemingly oblivious. Shepard wanted to use their element of surprise to its greatest extent, so she communicated with hand gestures to the team behind her. They were to focus fire on the closest adjutant, first.

Then, she supposed, they would just have to improvise. Not that that was any different from the usual.

On her mark, they opened fire. The adjutants startled, suddenly made aware of the presence in the room. A brief moment of confusion was all Shepard's team needed to take out the first one. The focused fire of more than a dozen soldiers, combined with Liara's biotic prowess, was enough to take out one unaware oaf.

The other two would be the problem. They turned towards the group and moved.

"Liara, stasis the one on the right. Everyone, focus fire on the left!"

As the monster on the right froze, trapped in Liara's biotic cage, Shepard fired as many rounds into the charging hulk coming at her from her left. Whitney fired a pistol equipped with incendiary rounds, and each little explosion punctuated the rapid fire of the team's weapons. Liara sent a singularity swirling into the beast, sucking it into the air.

The team continued to focus on the floating beast, and Shepard took her chance while both were immobilized. She cloaked and sprinted through the narrow path between the two adjutants and ducked behind an overturned market stall. The adjutants were now between her and her team.

The warp field destabilized and vanished, freeing up the relatively unharmed creature that was now on Shepard's left. The other one – still writhing in the singularity – was weakening, but she knew her team was too close to stop them both before one of the adjutants reached them. And then… well, she wasn't about to let any of her team be turned into a hulking monster. That just wasn't an option.

So she drew the second one away. As it approached her team, it noted her fire, coming from its back. It stopped, shuddering against the bullets, and turned back towards her as she lobbed a grenade at its feet.

The explosion gave her a brief moment to check her cloak. It was nearly recharged. She popped out of cover again to send a few precise slugs into the creature's head. It continued unrelentingly towards her.

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the other one fall, collapsing out of the singularity into a giant, broken heap on the floor.

"I need cover!" She called to her team over the comm.

They responded immediately, trapping the last adjutant between her fire and theirs. Still, it bore down on her. Closer, closer…

The recharge bar on her omni-tool lit up and she cloaked and dove away to her right, just as the adjutant toppled into her cover, throwing it aside. She backed away, invisible, and sent volleys of slugs towards it as she neared her team.

She ducked into cover beside Liara and lobbed another grenade over the barricade, landing it squarely between the adjutant's feet. She ducked down to reload and heard the grenade explode. Another staccato of gunfire, and then silence.

"That did it," Liara said.

"Group A eliminated," Shepard said into the comm.

"Group B weakening. We're doing fine," came Miranda's voice, rushed with adrenaline.

"We got two of our bastards. One more to go," was Aria's triumphant reply.

"Great," Shepard said. "We're heading to the coordinates for Group D. Radio me when you're on your way to your secondary targets."

"Understood."

"Message received."

Shepard nodded to the team.

"Good work, everybody. We've got a few more of these, so stay sharp."

It was going to be a long day…

**Whitney**

His legs burned from crouching and he fought to keep his arms from shaking from holding his gun. The adjutants were like nothing he had ever fought before. N7 training was rigorous and intense, but it hadn't prepared him for this.

They were on the last group, now. They had been fighting all day in the dark and seedy alleys, and their battlefield was lit by neon signage and the odd security floodlight.

Right now, he was cramped into cover splashed in orange light, blasting every last slug he had into the last remaining adjutant. Shepard had taken a position in the back, since she had run out of all but sniper ammo. Her orders came crisp and clear through the comm, coordinating the mismatched team of mercs, Cerberus troops, an Alliance lieutenant, and an asari scientist with a sort of verbal magic he had never seen before.

The loud _bam-BAM_ of her sniper rifle registered behind him, nailing the adjutant between its eyes. It staggered back, the fire of the rest of the team riddling its torso. Another sniper shot, this one landing on the left side of its forehead.

In the moment like this, when the adrenaline lifted his body from its fatigued attempts to collapse, everything slowed down. He could hear his own heartbeat above the rest of the commotion, telling him he was still alright. Still breathing, still receiving bloodflow to the important bits, still focusing. His heartbeat melded with Shepard's sniper shots in the quiet of his own head.

The adjutant in front of him – all grey and vivid blue – sharpened and seemed to grow in his vision. His assault rifle fired true, pebbling the creature's mottled torso with bullets.

A final _bam-BAM_ from Shepard and it tottered, slamming to the ground with a heavy, resonating thud.

He let out a deep sigh, feeling the blood throbbing in his head, filling his ears with the whooshing sound of the adrenaline seeping away. He adjusted his position, stretching out his legs and feeling the pins and needles surge up.

Shepard's voice filtered through his helmet over the comm.

"Last adjutant down on our end. Status?"

"A little busy over here," snapped the voice he recognized as belonging to the asari criminal.

"How many do you have left?" Shepard replied.

Whitney glanced over at her – she was standing in a relaxed posture, but he could see the energy in the line of her legs and the way she looked around, her eyes alert behind the plexi-glass of her helmet.

There was a pause, and the sound of gunfire crackled over the comms, then Aria's voice cut in.

"One left."

"We've taken out the last one here."

That voice was lighter, and spoke with an accent. _Miranda, _he reminded himself_, the new Cerberus leader. She used to work with Shepard._

There was a lot to absorb, but the information energized him.

"Great," Shepard responded. "Aria, we're coming to you."

"No need," Aria said as a reply. "Just dropped the bastard."

"Understood. We'll meet you both back at headquarters."

Shepard turned to the team, straightening and shouldering her rifle.

"We're moving out, team. Follow me."

**Shepard**

Aria's mood had improved dramatically. She was still snippy, but Shepard read the surge of hubris and cocky humor as a good. And indeed, the negotiations had gone well, with only a snarky comment or two to waylay them. Miranda and Aria had even shook hands without drawing a weapon on each other.

Shepard had taken the time to speak with the three marines that had infiltrated Cerberus. They were all that remained of the original strike team the Alliance had sent in. When the adjutants had started to run rampant through the base, there had been casualties on all sides. Shepard could see the pain in the eyes of the marines and could hear the regret in their voices. She assured them there had been nothing they could do, but she knew… it would take more than that to stop the nightmares.

She had given the strike team leader a knowing pat on the shoulder as he boarded the _Normandy._ She was intimately aware of the weight of the letters he would be writing in the upcoming days, and she wished there was more she could do.

As she prepared to board the _Normandy,_ Shepard took a moment to speak with Miranda. Behind them, Cerberus troops loaded onto ships.

"Miranda, please don't drop off the map again," Shepard said, her voice firm. Not pleading – requesting. "The Alliance – hell, the _galaxy_ – will want to feel that there's some transparency at Cerberus, at least for a while. It certainly has a hell of a reputation."

"Shepard," Miranda said, the softness of her reply barely blunting the edge of pride in her voice, "you know how I feel about the Illusive Man's work, now that I've seen the errors of my early days with Cerberus. I won't become him."

"_I_ know, Miranda," she replied. "But we've got a whole galaxy to convince."

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Liara approach, hovering just out of hearing range. Or at least, she thought so. Liara had proven herself to be far more cunning since her rise as the shadow broker, and Shepard wondered at times just how much her friend overheard when she appeared to not be listening.

"I'll do my best, Shepard," Miranda said sincerely. "Cerberus could have been something great. I want to make it what it should have been from the start."

"You will, Miranda. I have no doubt."

"Goodbye, Shepard," Miranda said, her gaze softening. "I never got to say thank you, back on Earth."

"No need," Shepard said quickly. "I should be thanking you for stepping in and helping the Alliance. Even after everything. Everyone played a part in this victory."

"Yeah, well, I know too well the weight you've carried, Shepard. Even if I didn't say it before, I want you to know that I appreciate… everything. If there's one thing the Illusive Man and I agreed on, it was that you were the only one who could do this."

"I'm not sure if I should be flattered or concerned," Shepard replied, hearing the half-laugh that underpinned her words.

"Flattered," Miranda said matter-of-factly. "I'll be in contact, Shepard. I'm trusting you to keep the bureaucrats off my back. I'll take care of the rest."

"Good luck, Miranda."

"You, too, Shepard."

She left with a nod and a smile, and Liara moved in quickly.

"Shepard, I told you I would inform you as soon as I heard anything from Earth."

"Tali?" Shepard felt her stomach gripped suddenly in that cold, clammy hand of fear.

But Liara smiled, calm and reassuring. Her eyes sparkled with joy.

"She's alright, Shepard. She's awake, and already aboard the _Tonbay._ They are en route to Rannoch."

Shepard felt the tension drain away. She said nothing – what words were there? She simply smiled and let Liara pull her into a relieved embrace.

"She's awake, Shepard," Liara said again, as if reassuring herself. "She's fine."


	11. Forever

_Author's Note: Thanks to all my loyal readers! I've been enjoying every step of this process. This is my first fan fiction, and your support and encouragement has made this an amazing experience. Thank you also to my lovely beta, Cyberian Tsuinami, whose notes are invaluable. And finally, thank you to Bioware - they own all the Mass Effect content (and maybe a little of my soul...)._

_Enjoy the chapter!_

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><p><strong>Chapter 11: "Forever"<strong>

**Shepard**

She checked her messages on her omni-tool as she boarded the _Normandy._ One from Garrus: _"Just checking in. I know you can't respond while you're groundside, but I just wanted to say that I'm thinking of you. Be careful." _She smiled at that one. He was letting his sentimental side out, and she found that she liked it. The next one was from Tali:

_Shepard,_

_I'm fine – I wanted you to know. I will return to Rannoch the moment the doctors clear me. There is much to be done. I hear the Alliance has already put you to work. When they finally give you that vacation you deserve, please come to Rannoch. I will make up a room for you in the house that I will build. You will forever have a place on our homeworld, Shepard. Please do not lose touch. _

_Your friend, _

_Tali'Zorah vas Rannoch_

"Commander," Joker said, breaking her reverie. She had stopped at the doors of the cockpit to read her messages, and he swiveled around in his chair, awaiting instruction.

EDI made a throat-clearing noise – she was practically human, now, Shepard realized – and Joker rolled his eyes.

"Sorry," he said, "_Captain."_

"Set a course for the Citadel. And EDI, please connect me to Admiral Hackett. I'll be in the comm room."

"Of course, Shepard," EDI responded.

Shepard wasted no time heading for the comm room. Whitney had already seen the three alliance marines to crew quarters, and she had plenty of time to speak to them en route to the Citadel.

"Admiral Hackett is available on vidcomm," EDI's voice spoke over the PA system as soon as Shepard set foot in the room.

"Connect him," she said.

The hologram of the Admiral appeared before her.

"Captain Shepard," he said. "How did it go on Omega?"

"Admiral Hackett," she said, saluting him. "We recovered three of the Alliance black ops team. They had managed to infiltrate Cerberus, but then Omega was besieged by reaper tech hybrids that were part of an old Cerberus project. We managed to clear the station of them, and it looks like they were the last of them. The black ops team lost four of their members to these things. I'll forward all the intel I got to you."

"And Cerberus?"

"Sir, new leadership has emerged. Miranda Lawson. She resigned from Cerberus while she was working with me, and she aided the Alliance on Earth. My assessment is that she is exactly the person we need in charge of Cerberus. She's smart, level-headed, and she's not an extremist."

Hackett considered this.

"I'll pass your recommendation along. People are wary of Cerberus, Shepard. Does your friend know what she's getting herself into?"

"She does, sir. I believe she can turn Cerberus around, make it into a legitimate organization."

"I hope you're right, Shepard," he said. "Good work, as always. I expect an official report once you've returned to the Citadel."

"Yes, sir."

"Hackett out."

As soon as the hologram flickered into nothingness, she turned, heading for her cabin. She had a private call to make.

**Garrus**

The call came in late, but he was still awake. Turians generally didn't sleep much, and he had been pacing the floors of his apartment, digesting the day's events. He answered it immediately when he saw that it came from the _Normandy._

"Hey," Shepard said, a smile warming her face when he answered.

"Hey," he said back, echoing that same warmth in his voice. "How did the mission go?"

"Well, it was definitely more complicated than I had expected," she chuckled.

"When isn't it?" Garrus said.

She nodded her agreement, then filled him in: "Aria was trying to retake Omega, and she ran into Cerberus."

"Cerberus?"

He was surprised to hear that. After the Illusive Man's failed attempt to control the reapers, he had expected Cerberus to fragment into chaos and then dissolve into nothingness. What were they doing fighting Aria on Omega?

"Yeah," she said, with a small, sly smile that he had come to recognize meant she had some juicy detail she wasn't sharing.

"And?" he prompted. "What else?"

"Well, Cerberus has a new leader," she teased, crossing her arms. He could see the sparkle in her eye even through the vidcomm.

"Am I supposed to guess?" he said, raising the ridge above his eye, "Or are you going to tell me?"

"Losing your touch, detective Vakarian? I guess I could tell you."

He chuckled, "It's been a while since I was a detective, Shepard. Now, I prefer to shoot first and ask questions later."

"I doubt that tendency will serve you well on the council," she said, crossing her arms and giving him one of her wicked looks.

"So you really are going to make me guess, hmm?"

"Can't let you get soft, Vakarian."

He chuckled and leaned back in his chair, thinking through the possibilites. The Illusive Man was dead, as was Kai Leng. He had witnessed that one himself, Shepard whirling in her chair, fist shattering the assasin's blade, omni-tool knife slashing into his side. Her voice had taken on a harsh tone he rarely heard from her, and her eyes had burned.

But he was getting distracted. Damn, he really was going soft. Well, assuming Cerberus hadn't had time to apply their Lazarus experiment to Kai Leng or The Illusive Man, or Henry Lawson… Huh. Lawson.

He met Shepard's eye over the vid and saw from her grin that she knew he'd solved it.

"Miranda?" he asked.

"You got it. Ms. Lawson jumped in to fill the power vacuum and has Cerberus under her charge, now."

"Hmm," he said.

"Hmm?" She mimicked him.

"I don't know what I think of that," he confessed.

Miranda hadn't made many friends among the crew of the _Normandy, _but he admired her resignation from Cerberus. It showed she could see reason, and he had to admit she had fought hard to right Cerberus's wrongdoings since she had left.

"I think it couldn't be better," Shepard said honestly. "We have an ally, and Miranda is the best person to keep Cerberus in line. She knows how they work, she can earn their loyalty, and she has motivation to keep them clean."

"Her father," Garrus guessed.

"Exactly," Shepard said. "Miranda's made it her mission in life to undo her father's work. It runs deep, Garrus, and I think it will serve her well."

"I'm glad to hear it," Garrus said, truthfully.

"Getting Aria and Miranda to work together was the real struggle."

He couldn't help the way his eyes widened at that. She chuckled at his bug-eyed look.

"You never cease to amaze me, Shepard. First, the turians and the krogan. Then, the quarians and the geth. Now you have Aria T'Loak working with Cerberus. Should I worry that you've put me under this spell of yours, too?"

She shot him a look filled with both longing and amusement.

"You can be released any time you want, big guy."

"Never," he said, his voice low.

He would worship this woman his entire life and never regret a moment of it.

"Good," she said.

A yawn seemed to catch her by surprise and she stretched out in her chair. She moved in such an unusual way – twisting her arms back in a way that, were she a turian, she would be blocked by her cowl.

"It's been a long day," she apologized.

"You should get some rest," he told her.

"Oh, before I do, you should know," she said, "I received word from Tali."

He breathed a sigh of relief: "She's awake?"

"Yes, and as I understand it, she's eager to return to Rannoch and dive in to the redevelopment, there."

"Of course," Garrus replied, feeling his mandibles twitch in a warm smile. "She was always a bundle of energy."

There was a short pause, and Shepard yawned again.

"I'm glad she's alright," Garrus finally said.

"You know, you did what you could," Shepard told him, her face taking on that earnest, open look that she had when she was trying to convince him of something. "She's alive because of you."

"She might have been on her feet a week ago if I had reacted faster," he replied automatically.

"Garrus," she said, her voice soft.

She looked at him a moment, letting his name be her supplication. He met her eyes calmly.

"We're all lucky to be alive. And everyone did their best – more than I could possibly have asked of you. All the credit the galaxy gives me – I owe it to you. My team. You all surprised me at every turn by giving more than you needed to."

"Shepard," he said, letting his own voice drop like hers had. "We all would have followed you into hell and back again."

"Just like old times," she said, smiling.

"Yeah. Just like old times."

Her smile brightened and he wished then that he could reach out and kiss her, the way she liked, and nip at her neck. He needed the smell of her, the taste of her, the feel of her in his arms. He suppressed a sigh.

"Get some sleep," he said. "I know you need it. When will you be back on the Citadel?"

"We dock late tomorrow. I'll message you our ETA once Joker gets us to the relay."

"Okay," he said. "I'll see you then."

"Okay," she replied, and he could see the way her shoulders were stooping from exhaustion. Good thing her bed was within arm's reach.

"Good night, Shepard," he said, his voice disclosing what he wasn't saying in words.

The way she smiled back at him told him she knew exactly what he meant.

"Good night, Garrus," she said.

And then the screen flickered to black.

**Shepard**

She only slept a few hours, but the sleep was heavy and absent of nightmares. When she woke, she found herself reaching for her datapad, still tangled in the blankets and loose with sleepiness. A dream lingered in the back of her mind – a happy feeling whose source she couldn't quite place. Then she remembered their conversation last night and a thought emerged.

She ran a search, and for a moment, she felt like she had months ago at the start of her romance with Garrus. Then, the searches had been turian-human mating, in the purely physical sense, along with early courtship rituals. The results had left her flushed and embarrassed and a little fearful for all the things that could go wrong.

Now, the search she ran still pertained to turian-human mating, but went much deeper. What did it mean for a turian to be in love?

Garrus rarely waxed sentimental, but she knew him well enough to see how his behavior towards her had changed. She understood exactly how he felt, because those same emotions governed her own behavior now. Tones of voice, turns of phrase, secret looks and private caresses.

She felt a strange, giddy sensation rise up in her with every page of extranet wisdom she absorbed. She wanted to laugh out loud, not from humor, but just from joy. She shut down the datapad, letting herself revel in that feeling of lightness.

If she was reading him right, and she was sure she was, then she may have stumbled into one of the most powerful experiences of love and completeness that anyone could have.

It had snuck up on her, in the midst of war, death, and hardship. He had snuck up on her and stolen her away while she was distracted. And she didn't mind a bit.

And if she was reading him right…

She would have to talk to him when she saw him next.

She cast aside the bedsheets and dressed in regulation Alliance blues, making her way down to the mess hall to grab a protein bar and a mug of coffee, which she took to Liara's office. She knocked on the solid steel doors.

"It's Shepard," she said, as if her all-seeing friend didn't know.

"Come in," Liara's voice called from inside, and the doors whirred open in front of her.

"Got a minute?" Shepard asked.

Liara nodded: "Did you need something?"

"Just wanted to talk," she explained. "I haven't had a chance to see how you were doing since we left Earth."

"To be honest, I'm a little overwhelmed," Liara began. She stood, picking up a datapad and typing something into it. "I lost many of my agents in the reaper attacks. I will need to recruit, re-staff. I actually wanted to ask you something."

"Shoot," Shepard said, settling herself into a chair and taking a sip of her coffee.

Liara continued to type as she spoke: "My resources are limited – at least, not as extensive as they were before. I need to regroup and rebuild my network."

Shepard nodded. She wasn't entirely sure where Liara was going with this.

"I would like to establish a permanent base of operations somewhere. I will need to acquire a new ship and outfit it with stealth capabilities, but most importantly, I need to find a site – somewhere out of the way, and that offers no value to pirates, slavers, or colonists. I have been researching and identified a few candidates."

She handed the datapad to Shepard, showing her the list of planets and asteroids that Liara had identified as sufficiently covert.

"This won't be a quick process," Liara continued. "And I understand that you will still have duties as a Spectre – assignments and missions…"

She trailed off.

"I would be glad to help you scout these locations, Liara," Shepard said. "And I may be able to help you with the ship, too. You may be the shadow broker, but I have a few useful connections myself."

She smiled at her friend, who was beaming at her.

"Thank you, Shepard," Liara said enthusiastically.

"Of course," Shepard replied, though she had to admit that she felt uneasy knowing that Liara would one day leave the _Normandy_. Tali's full attention was on returning to Rannoch to help her people re-assimilate. Vega was on Earth, occupied with his training. Miranda was running Cerberus, now. Jack was a teacher, and couldn't afford to leave her students to gallivant around on adventures. Ashley, Mordin, Thane, and Legion…

Her team – people she had trusted with her life, in whose lives she had become intimately involved – were scattered across the galaxy like so much debris.

And Garrus… Garrus was on the Citadel. Still part of her life, but she couldn't deny the strangeness of his distance. Even long before she had felt the first aches of love for him arise in her body, she had always kept him at her side. Every time they went planet-side, every infiltration, every exploration; she had always felt safer knowing he was watching her back.

She arose. It wouldn't do to reveal these feelings to Liara. She had her own responsibilities, and who was Shepard to ask her to set those aside for her own nostalgic longings?

As if reading her thoughts, Liara's gaze softened and she spoke gently:

"Shepard, you know I will always see myself as part of your team," she said. "I've installed one of my quantum communicators onboard the _Normandy,_ and I want you to consider me your first source for information."

Shepard perked up at that.

"A quantum communicator? Where?"

Liara smiled sheepishly: "Your cabin. I planted it when I was there to record your story for the time capsule."

Shepard laughed at that.

"I didn't know what was going to happen, then. But I knew that I always wanted to be able to reach you. No matter the circumstances," she paused, and when Shepard didn't respond immediately, she insisted: "The communicator cannot be activated from a distance. Both parties must accept the call. Don't worry, Shepard. Your private life is private."

"Mostly," Shepard replied, raising an eyebrow. "Normally, I'd be concerned about someone planting mysterious tech in my cabin, but since it's you…" she drifted off. "Thank you, Liara. I don't want to lose you."

"You won't," Liara reassured. "I may be in hiding on a remote planet, or in plain sight on the Citadel, but wherever I am, you will always be able to find me, Shepard."

She clasped Shepard's hands in her own, her blue gaze searching.

"I owe you my life, Shepard. Multiple times over. And the galaxy owes you its future," she paused. "But most importantly, you have been a truer friend to me than I have ever known. And for that, you have my loyalty and my friendship, forever."


	12. Celebrity Couple

Author's Note: Hi everyone! So sorry this one has been such a long time coming. I wound up in the hospital last week with appendicitis, and since the surgery I've been pretty out of it thanks to the anesthesia and the painkillers. But I'm now back in the swing of things, mostly back to normal, minus an appendix and plus some scars (though not as sexy as our favorite turian's scars). I've got a super fluffy chapter with a touch of sexytimes for y'all to make up for the wait.

Thanks to Bioware for their amazing universe, and to CyberianTsuinami for the patient reading and editing and for the moral support!

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><p><strong>Chapter 12: "Celebrity Couple"<strong>

**Shepard**

The crew had all gathered in the airlock of the _Normandy_ in the sort of impromptu social assembly that fell into place as naturally as breathing for a team that was used to trusting each other with their lives. Shepard stood in the CIC, just in sight of the congregation, pleased with the way her new team members were melding with her oldest friends. She hadn't had a living relative she could recognize since she was sixteen years old, but for three years she hadn't felt like an orphan.

Family. She smiled at the sight. Tara threw her head back in a laugh, linking arms with Cortez, whose blue eyes sparkled at whatever Whitney had just said. Liara and Traynor had been engaged in a deep and no doubt scientific conversation, but were pulled into the magnetism of the group. Joker limped out from the cockpit with EDI, locking the door behind him.

Joker caught her gaze and waved, drawing the crew's attention to their commander as she stepped forward.

They exited together, both a multitude and a unit. Organized chaos. She encouraged them away on their shore leave, glad to see them flocking together even as they left the ship. Similar and different. Family.

As she stepped off the _Normandy _onto the docking bay of the Citadel, she caught sight of Garrus leaning against a guard rail. He straightened when he saw her, uncrossing his arms and closing the space between them. C-Sec officers patrolled the dock – an unusual number hovered near Garrus.

"You really didn't have to meet me here," she said as Garrus reached her, smiling nonetheless.

"Yes, I did," he said, pulling her into an embrace and touching their foreheads together.

She noticed a turian in a C-Sec uniform watching them over Garrus's shoulder. Another to her left stepped closer to them. Garrus noticed her discomfort and whispered into her ear.

"Sorry about the security detail," he said. "It's mandatory."

"You must love that," she teased.

He let out a huff that was almost a growl and clearly meant: _not at all._

He loosened the embrace, leaving one arm slung around her shoulder as her own arm encircled his waist.

"So," he said. "I have some work to do, unfortunately, but I don't need to be in my office to do it. Shall we go back to our apartment? I'm sure you could do with some rest, and a meal. I made sure to stock the kitchen with levo-amino food for you."

"_Our_ apartment?" she asked.

He stopped, turning to look at her, suddenly vulnerable.

"Yes," he said quietly. "I thought…"

She cut him off with a quick kiss on his mouth.

"Relax, big guy," she crooned. "I like the sound of that."

He smiled, and they continued walking in a serene silence.

"So I guess this means things are getting pretty serious," she ventured.

"You know turians. We do everything seriously."

She laughed at that: "I remember you telling me you weren't a very good turian."

He stopped again and braced her shoulders with his talons, looking her in the eye.

"I'm not," he said. "But I'm serious about you."

The way he was looking at her made her muscles rush with heat and loosen until she thought she might just sink into his arms, but she held herself firm. She reached up and caressed the scarred side of his face, meeting his gaze with strength.

"I'm glad," she said softly, her voice light. She felt the wideness of her smile in the pleasant aching of her cheeks.

"Good," he said, smiling. "It's good to see you like this more often."

"But Garrus," she said, smiling at the way he tilted his head to indicate he was listening. "I'm serious about you, too."

He said nothing, just nuzzled her cheek with his own. She heard the quiet purr of happiness in his throat as she brushed his neck with her lips.

"Councilor Vakarian!"

The sharp voice cut through them, and they retreated from each other, straightening. Shepard glanced over to her right and groaned when she saw the owner of that strident voice. The C-Sec security detail tightened around them – just enough for Shepard to notice.

"Commander Shepard?"

Khalisah Bint Sinan Al-Jilani's eyes widened when she recognized the human that Garrus had been canoodling with. As she approached the couple, Shepard muttered to Garrus under her breath:

"You have about ten seconds to decide just how serious you are, Garrus, because this is about to be splashed all over Citadel news."

He didn't have time to respond.

"Khalisah Bint Sinan Al-Jilani, Westerlund News," she said, holding out her hand in introduction.

"I know who you are, Khalisah," Shepard said tiredly.

Khalisah looked expectantly at Garrus, who stared at her outstretched hand as if he were unfamiliar with this human custom. Of course, he wasn't unfamiliar at all… But after a moment, Khalisah gave up and bowed her head to him. He returned the gesture.

"Councilor, Commander. Will you answer a few questions for me?"

Shepard looked to Garrus. She had dealt with Khalisah enough to be indifferent. Garrus gave her a little smile and took one of her hands in his own.

"It's Captain, now," he informed Khalisah. "Captain Shepard."

"Of course," she said, brushing that off. "Congratulations on the promotion, Captain. Now that the reapers have been defeated, what's next for the savior of the galaxy?"

"I'm still a spectre, Khalisah. There will always be work for the spectres, and while I can't reveal any details of my assignments, I'm sure the Council will keep me busy."

"Speaking of the Council," Khalisah said, looking pointedly at their joined hands, "how can you assure the public that your alleged relationship with Councilor Vakarian won't interfere with the Council's judgment? Spectres answer only to the Council, after all."

_Alleged?_ Shepard raised an eyebrow. She felt Garrus tense beside her, and heard the controlled growl in his voice as he responded.

"Captain Shepard is a professional, and so am I," he said deliberately. "We keep our personal life and our professional life separate. We have worked together as a team for the past three years, and our _relationship_ has not interfered with our duties."

Khalisah turned to face her camera, speaking directly to her audience:

"You heard it here first. The illustrious Captain Shepard cozying up to the newly-appointed turian councilor, here on the Citadel. They have managed to keep the details of their relationship a secret, but this intrepid reported has an exclusive."

"I don't think so," Garrus said. "Those are the only _details_ you're going to get."

"You two are heroes, galactic celebrities. People want to hear your story."

"Khalisah," Shepard interjected, "the galaxy is still reeling from the most devastating attack any of our cultures have every experienced. People are suffering, still. Relief is scarce, and few planets have the resources to help themselves, let alone their neighbors. We made it out of this because we worked together, but there is still work to do. Don't you think there are better things you could be doing with your time and your media influence than reporting on celebrity couples?"

"Captain, human interest stories always have a market."

"Yeah?" Shepard asked, crossing her arms and leaning forward towards the persistent reporter. "There's always an audience, huh? Even with the billions who are cut off on smoldering planets, waiting for someone – anyone – to lend a helping hand? The work didn't stop with Earth. Councilor Vakarian and I are doing our part to support the galactic community, to keep people working together so we can pull ourselves out of this mess as stronger, better people. What are you doing?"

Khalisah just stood there, her mouth opening and closing soundlessly. With a little chuckle, Garrus pulled Shepard away, his arm around her waist.

"Have a nice day, Ms. Al-Jilani," he tossed over his shoulder as they left.

She smirked, knowing the inexhaustible gaze of Khalisah and her cameras were following them as they left.

"Well, Garrus, I believe we've just been _outed."_

He grunted.

**Garrus**

"So. How is it being the all-powerful turian councilor?" She asked him later, crossing into the kitchen of the open-floor plan apartment.

Her tone was sincere, but her delicately arched eyebrow and badly-suppressed grin told him she was poking fun at him. He grimaced.

"It's… going to take some getting used to."

She let out a laugh, opening a cabinet in the kitchen and pulling out a box of ready-to-eat levo food – one of the random assortment he'd pulled off the store shelves. Some sort of brownish meat in a sauce with little white things that looked like the tiny insects that inhabited his mother's garden back on Palaven. It must taste good, or they wouldn't eat it, but he didn't see the appeal.

He turned on the terminal at the desk in the living room as Shepard rummaged around in the kitchen, heating up her dinner.

He answered a few emails and brought up some documents that Aethyta had sent him. The quarian Admiralty Board – more specifically, Admirals Han Gerrel and Daro Xen – had requested a hearing with the council. News had broken about the krogan council seat, and quite frankly, he was not surprised to have his inbox flooded with news of the quarian reaction.

In his opinion, the galaxy needed to keep the unity they had gained in the fight against the reapers. More council members would help support the galaxy as it rebuilt. The challenge would be to convince Sati and, more onerously, Adreon.

He sighed. Shepard looped an arm around his neck, leaning in close and balancing the bowl with her dinner in her other arm. She kissed him softly atop his fringe, turning his sigh into a purr and soothing his nerves.

She released him and started eating her dinner, still standing at his shoulder.

"Anything pressing?" she asked.

"Well, everyone who has messaged me seems to think their issue is urgent," he said.

"Some things never change," she said, her mouth full of food.

He chuckled. That should be comforting, but somehow, it wasn't.

She finished her dinner in silence, setting the bowl aside and draping her arms over his carapace again, pressing her lips softly against the top of his fringe. He sighed into the touch. This, he could get used to. He leaned back into her, continuing to read the briefs that Aethyta had sent to him about the quarians.

As she continued to kiss his fringe softly, he nuzzled closer to her, closing his eyes at the gentle sensations. She laughed quietly, and he opened his eyes again.

"You're like a big kitten, stretched out in the sun," she said, trailing her fingertips against the smooth skin inside his cowl.

"I have no idea what that means," he said. "But I'm pretty sure I should be insulted."

She laughed again: "Not insulted. It's adorable."

"I'm a turian," he replied, feigning offense. "We don't do 'adorable.'"

"Mmm hmm," she replied, her tone sarcastic. "Big, scary apex predator my ass."

He growled a little at that, and she started to kiss just beneath the fringe in that spot that sent shivers down his back.

"You know, you're making it very difficult for me to get any work done," he said.

She slid her hands beneath his shirt, massaging the plating of his chest. Her mouth continued to caress the sensitive skin beneath his fringe.

"What a pity," she said, clearly not intending to change anything she was doing.

He wasn't sure how he managed it, but he actually read all the way to the end of the document, her soft touches pulling his attention effectively away. It took all his turian self-control, but he read the final sentence thoroughly and closed the brief.

Her hands pulled gently at the ridges on his chest – just enough pressure to get through the thick plating to the nerves below. Garrus twisted around in his seat and planted his hands firmly on her waist, drawing her around the chair and into his lap. She smiled, settling herself in and draping her arms around his neck.

"Got your attention?" she asked.

"Undivided, now," he said, hearing the low register his voice had dropped to. She had that effect on him.

His hands slipped under her shirt, and he trailed his talons lightly over her waist and lower back. She sighed and relaxed into him.

"Good," she said. "Because I just want to be with you tonight. No distractions."

"I can do that," he said, kissing her.

Shepard's response was to draw his tongue into her mouth, teasing its rough surface with her softer, spongy tongue. She pressed her chest against his, kneading the skin beneath his fringe gently.

She pulled away from the kiss, ducking her head down to his neck and teasing the sensitive skin with her tongue as her fingers quickly unfastened his shirt. She had become quite adept at that since their first night together, when he had to guide her through the process. Everything had been so foreign, at first. Counter-intuitive.

But now, it was second nature.

Cool air met his plates as Shepard peeled his shirt away. She sat up, running her hands all over the ridges of his chest.

"I missed you on the _Normandy,_" she said. "I sleep better when you're there."

"I missed you, too," he said, sliding her shirt up over her head.

He trailed a talon along the line of her collarbone. He kept his talons clipped now, for her; they were mostly vestigial, anyway. There was not much that claws could do that a sniper rifle couldn't.

The little bumps that rose up on her skin when he touched her this way thrilled him. Turian skin was rough, thick, and not very pliable. Even in the areas where it was softest and most sensitive, it still didn't have that immediate, intense physical response to touch.

She leaned in and kissed his scarred mandible, her tongue teasing wet trails along the sensitive underside. Her cool body against him was intoxicating – foreign, alien. Part of him hoped he would never get used to it: she would always be _new_ to him in a way.

She clambered out of his lap and slid to her knees on the floor, looking up at him through her eyelashes. His stomach fluttered at that look, and he felt his already-loosened abdominal plates slide apart as she let her fingers caress the fabric just beneath the waistband of his pants. She kissed his torso where bare skin met cloth and said in a husky voice:

"Don't move."

She rose, disappearing briefly into the bedroom. When she returned seconds later, she tossed aside an empty antihistamine shot and knelt between his legs again, handing him a second shot. He injected it quickly as she replaced herself between his legs.

Her hands teased, tormented. She tugged at his waistband, and he shifted, letting her tug the remaining clothing from his hips.

And then her mouth was on him, and he groaned.

This, he would _never_ get used to. It was something no turian woman could ever do, not with razor sharp teeth and tough mouth plates. There was no give in a turian's mouth, but _oh_ was there give in Shepard's. Gentle, full lips that molded around him. Supple, velvety tongue that stroked and caressed him.

The way she looked up at him filled his chest with a deep affection, until his torso felt like it would swell to bursting.

"Spirits," he gasped, following his exclamation with a moan. He whispered her name, feeling her intensity grow as he did so.

His hands tightened around the armrests of the chair. He felt his body arching into her as she brought him to the edge and carried him smoothly over.

As he collapsed into the chair, panting, she rose and planted small, light kisses along his carapace and neck. He folded her into his arms and she snuggled into his lap.

He nuzzled against her neck, brushing her hair away with his hand and lapping his tongue against the back of her neck. He knew it would make her shiver with pleasure, and he was not disappointed to see that she responded as he expected.

"I swear you are something out of a dream, Shepard," he murmured into the curve where her neck met her shoulders. "Is there anything you can't do?"

"Dance," she said simply.

He chuckled.

"Maybe not in a club," he said. "But you dance for me all the time."

"Is that so?"

The words came out a sigh as his tongue found her neck again.

"Garrus," she said. "I want to talk to you about something."

"What is it?" He continued to lavish attention on her slender neck and sculpted shoulders.

"You said something to me a while ago. It was when we were up on top of the presidium."

"Mmm?"

"Well, I didn't have time to think about it then, but now that I do… I did some research."

She nudged him gently away from her neck to look him in the eyes.

"Garrus," she said, holding his face in her hands, searching him with her bright, intelligent eyes. "I know that turians generally have casual relationships, until they find someone they want to settle down with... And then, they… they mate for life."

He felt his insides twist in a strange, fearful pang. He had danced around this issue, afraid to intimidate her. He wanted to move at her pace, since he already knew that he was incurably, irrevocably, and impossibly in love with her. The worry that he might speak too soon, before she was ready, and lose her forever…

She kissed the flat bridge of his nose lightly before she continued.

"Garrus, I know I told you that I couldn't promise anything when you rejoined the crew a few months ago. But that was then. We were in the middle of a war, and…"

Her voice wavered on the last word and she paused, and he saw something flicker in her eyes. She looked away from him for the first time and drew a deep breath.

"…and I didn't know if either of us would make it out alive."

She looked back at him, her voice returning to its firm, confident pitch:

"But I want you to know. If I'm that woman for you, then I promise you: I will never leave. I'm yours, Garrus. I told you once you would never be alone, and I want you to know it wasn't the sort of thing humans say at the start of a relationship that may not still be true in a few years. We've been through hell, together, Garrus. And I want to be a one-turian kind of woman. For the rest of my days."

Her speech knocked his breath from his lungs, and for a few moments, he could only stare.

"Tell me if I'm misreading this," she said hastily. "I know turians don't often mate with other species, and I know your dad wouldn't like me and – "

"Anyone who doesn't approve of this liaison can go to hell," he interrupted, his voice rough.

She kissed him, and when they parted, he pulled her against him, wrapping her in his arms.

"Shepard, I don't care what my father thinks. He's had to accept that I make decisions he doesn't approve of. And you are the only one for me. _That,_ I am sure of."

She stood, then, wriggling out of the rest of her clothes, and tugged him up from the chair. She guided them into the bedroom and settled herself down on the edge of the bed, beckoning him towards her. He knelt between her legs, bringing his hands to her waist as she stretched her legs up so that her feet hooked over his shoulders.

"You're mine, Garrus," she whispered, her hands cupping his face, her lips tracing his mandibles. "Official or not, we belong to each other."

She gasped as he slid into her, their voices pooling together in the cool air of the apartment.

"My mate," he murmured as he surged against her, feeling her respond in kind.

"My husband," she said, her voice tender.

They escalated together, their movements like the rush of an ocean, ebbing and flowing, surging and receding. They poured out phrases of love, of eternal bonds. They were one, and when they both cried out as one, their motions waned together.

**Shepard**

Garrus slid up beside her on the bed as she collapsed back, drawing her into his arms as he lay on his back. She gasped for air and felt her heartbeat shake her chest with each powerful _bah-BUM._ Garrus laid a hand on her chest and chuckled softly.

"What?" She murmured the word affectionately.

"I can't get over how… well, how little there is to protect the human body. I can feel your heartbeat through your skin."

"Yeah, well that's what the armor is for," she said, swatting at his hand and hearing his quiet chuckle in response.

He held her in silence, but she could feel a question arising in him. The way his breath caught every so often. His chest would rise and fall, and then still for a moment… only to start rising and falling again. He drew her in closer.

"Shepard," he said, his voice soft in her ear. "I haven't told my family yet. About us. But I will."

"It's okay, Garrus," she said, wrapping her arm around his waist and drawing herself in against him.

"I have to go to Palaven next week. The primarch wants me to give a speech at a Hierarchy ceremony."

"Mmm, sounds fun," she said.

A gentle rumble in his chest spread through her as he chuckled.

"Sure," he said. "But I wanted to ask… would you come with me? I'm sure I can arrange for you to be off-duty for a few days."

"There are perks to being the boss, aren't there?"

"Yes, but you didn't answer me."

She pushed herself up on her elbow, meeting his eyes and reaching up to cup his face in her free hand.

"Garrus. Of course."

"I want to introduce you… to my family."

She measured him with her gaze, felt the nervousness in his shallow breathing, his chest rising and falling against her ribcage. He held her gaze, his eyes questioning, searching.

"Is your father going to be okay? With us?"

His eyes turned cloudy, intense.

"Like I said," he rumbled, "anyone who doesn't approve can go to hell. But I'm not a bad enough turian that I wouldn't bring my mate home to meet my family. I want to at least try."

She kissed him softly then, along the smooth, blue-tinted ridge of his left cheek.

"Shepard," he sighed, pulling her closer.

One arm closed around her waist and another behind her head and he rolled onto his side, pressing against her, hard ridges against soft flesh. She responded by hooking a leg around his waist, adjusting and folding herself into him. His talons stroked her hair, gently scratching at her scalp, and she closed her eyes.

"Mmm," she murmured into the crook of his shoulder. "That feels nice."

He responded by drawing her closer, keeping his hand moving through the tendrils of her hair. Lying there, feeling the warmth of his body against her and breathing in that fresh, autumn scent of him, she couldn't quell the note of happiness that had begun to sing inside of her.


	13. Trouble Brewing

Author's Note: Alright, everyone, chapter 13 is here! After all that fluff, you get a dose of plot. Thanks for your patience as I continue to recover from surgery - and thanks to everyone who reviews. I try to respond to all reviews, but for those of you who review anonymously, I can't reply directly, so here's your message: I love you guys, and I appreciate your feedback!

Enjoy! As always, Bioware's property belongs to Bioware.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 13: "Trouble Brewing"<strong>

**Shepard**

Garrus had to work the following day, but Shepard, eager to stretch her legs, abandoned the apartment to walk in the presidium. She had some supplies to purchase for the _Normandy, _anyhow, and wanted to look for new mods for her sniper rifle.

She relished her time alone on the Citadel. It had always been a respite – a chance to be out with the general public – no responsibilities, and at least a little anonymous. Of course, anonymity was quickly eluding her, as her face was broadcast on every news channel galaxy-wide. She had noticed more than a few double-takes, and most of the shopkeepers called her by name, even if she had never patronized their store before. It was unnerving.

But at least she didn't need a full security detail, like Garrus did.

A few hours of window shopping, three ammo mods, and an extended scope later – the _Normandy's _supplies on their way to the beloved ship with a delivery crew – Shepard's stomach began to growl, and she settled into a booth at a small, hole-in-the-wall levo restaurant near their apartment.

She ordered an asari dish that Liara had recommended to her and sat back to watch the patrons in the restaurant. A batarian at a table across the room shot daggers at her when she made eye contact.

Ah, yes, there was that, too. Having a recognizable face was one thing when you were a hero to most of the population. It was completely another thing when you had destroyed an entire star system and nearly committed genocide.

Aratoht haunted her dreams in the six months she spent under house arrest on earth. It wasn't that she had been careless – it was that she had tried and failed. She woke, sweaty and shaking in the dark of her room – her gilded prison – with the horrific visions her imagination conjured of mutilated batarians: men, women, and children.

Despite what they had done to her family, her colony, she had sworn to never let that bring her down. She would never sink as low as they had. She would never blame an entire race for the actions of a few slavers.

She blamed the bitter taste of the food, when it arrived, on her own spoiled mood. She would have to ask Liara to take her to an asari restaurant next time, if she wanted to appreciate the cuisine. Sitting here, alone in a booth with acrid thoughts and dark memories in her head, was no way to enjoy a meal.

She finished the dish to quell the hungry growl in her stomach and paid her bill, returning quickly to the apartment. She ran a few miles on the treadmill, letting the anxious energy burn out of her until there was nothing left but aching legs and the salty taste of sweat on her lips.

A hot shower awaited, and then Garrus would be home. They would stay in again tonight. She could use a warm embrace, and he was always ready to oblige.

**Tali**

She was absorbed in the plans for the new Capitol building when Raan approached her. The Admiralty had charged her with the overseeing the design for the new official buildings and appointed her the lead engineer, and she wanted to make them something… something remarkable. There were plenty of poets and journalists looking for words to say how the quarians felt about returning to their homeworld. Tali wasn't as good with words, but she wanted the architecture of these regal, political buildings to shout to the world the feeling that was in her heart right now.

And nothing quite measured up. Not that she was surprised.

So when Raan pulled her away from her work, it was almost a relief. Almost. She was churning with energy: equal parts frustration and excitement with her work, and a strange lurking boredom in the back of her mind. Her shotgun was in a storage bin somewhere, and while she would have given anything for that to be the case three years ago, now…

Well, she had changed.

And when Raan told her that Han Gerrel and Daro Xen had approached the council on their own to request a quarian seat without consulting the rest of the Admiralty, her first instinct was to go get that shotgun out of its retirement. She would have to get used to civilian life again… Not everything dangerous needed to be shot.

But it definitely needed to be handled.

**Shepard**

The council had no assignments for her, and she had already called in her leave for the following week, when she and Garrus would go to Palaven. Her crew was still on duty, and she was not willing to twiddle her thumbs on the Citadel when she had her own work she could be doing.

Liara met her in the captain's cabin aboard the _Normandy_, and as Shepard poured them each a cup of coffee, she watched the fish swim idly in their turquoise tank.

"Are you and Garrus settling in?" she asked, turning to accept the steaming mug and smiling serenely.

"Everything has been great, so far. It will take some getting used to. The apartment is definitely not par for the Alliance course. The Council spares no expense," Shepard chuckled.

She shook her head at the stark contrast. The upgraded _Normandy_ had seemed lavish when Cerberus had presented it to her, but it was still nothing in comparison to the sleek opulence of the Citadel apartment.

_No, not "nothing," _she corrected herself. _Just different. More modest, more comfortable. Home._

"I am glad that you have both found peace," Liara said. "And comfort."

She smiled, her eyes twinkling over her mug as she took a sip. Shepard smiled back.

"Yeah," she said. "Yeah, me too."

"I like this drink," Liara said suddenly. "It's one of the first things I tried on the _Normandy. _ It smelled so… unusual."

"Do you not have anything like this on asari worlds?"

"No," said Liara. "Nothing quite like this."

She took another sip. Shepard pulled out her datapad.

"I looked over those coordinates you sent me. We have about four days free, so we can check out a few of the closer systems. If we hit Gemini Sigma first and check out Paravin and Huningto, then we can hop over to Artemis Tau to look at the planets you flagged there."

Liara slipped behind Shepard, peering over her shoulder at the datapad.

"Good," she said. "Methodical. Sweep the systems, starting with the nearest ones."

"Exactly," Shepard said, scrolling through the data. "If we make good time, we can stop by a few of the nearby clusters, too, but we'll have to leave the farther systems for another time."

Liara nodded earnestly.

"That sounds like a plan, Shepard. I just want to collect some data, see what we can discover. Perhaps one of these will be suited for a new Shadow Broker hub."

Shepard nodded, regarding her friend curiously.

"Liara, I don't know what you think you'll find. All these locations are completely unremarkable."

Liara smiled, then.

"Exactly."

After Liara returned to her downstairs office, Shepard sent out a mission briefing to the team, and the following morning they met aboard the _Normandy_ for the recon mission. They would hit the Han system in the Gemini Sigma cluster first, and see where their research led them.

**Garrus**

His office was hushed – he knew that Teanna was on her lunch break, and he also knew he should probably also take a break. The preliminary call with the quarian Admiralty had not gone incredibly well, particularly since only a few admirals (none of which he counted as allies) had been present.

_That Xen has always been a problem brewing_, he thought to himself.

He glanced at his galactic clock. It was late on Palaven, but not too late. Sol would still be up. He sent her a quick message.

_You available for a call? Need some advice. G._

He stretched, letting some of the tension bleed from his muscles. A simple lunch sat on a tray on the corner of his desk, but his nerves had created a deep pit in his stomach, and food was the last thing he wanted right now.

His omni-tool pinged with a message from Solana.

_Big brother wants my advice? I'm honored. Be on in a minute. S._

He smiled and typed back simply:

_It's Dad-related._

Within a few seconds, she had replied: _Ah._

He took a moment to pace the room, letting the blood flow to his legs warm the stiff muscles. Adrenaline was still singing in his veins when her call came in at his terminal. Hastily, he sat back down and connected the call.

Solana's face appeared on the screen, elegant and poised. One thing had to admit of his younger sister – she had always had a sort of ease about her that he lacked.

"Hey, Sol," he said.

"Hey, Gar. So what's up?"

He laced his fingers together, twisting his hands to release the tension that had found its way all the way to his joints. He repeated to himself silently that anyone who disapproved of his relationship with Shepard could go to hell, and then he launched into it.

"Sol, I'm coming to Palaven next week for a meeting with the Primarch. I wanted to come home for a few days afterwards. I've… well, I've met somebody. Somebody special. I want to bring her home to meet Dad, but it's…. well, it's complicated."

Solana's face lit up.

"Spirits, Garrus, are you serious? What do you need my help for? Dad will be thrilled! You've finally found someone to settle down with! And he and Mom were so worried about those scars of yours. Dad was certain you'd be a bachelor for ages."

Garrus winced.

"Tactful, Sol."

"Sorry, Gar, it's true. But clearly, it didn't matter. You found someone who saw past all that."

"Yeah," he said carefully. "She saw past… quite a lot."

"Oh stop being modest, Gar, you're a war hero. So who is she?"

Garrus shifted in his seat. The image of Solana so excited, her hands clasped together in front of her face in unadulterated joy… What was that human phrase Shepard said sometimes? It was one of those phrases that made no sense, but it seemed to fit the circumstances here. _The other shoe was about to drop…_

"Well, that's the complicated part, Sol," he explained, taking a deep breath. "She's… well, she's human."

As he expected, Sol's face dropped. Her hands returned to her lap, and her posture turned to stony silence.

"She's… she's not turian?"

"No, Sol."

She took that in quietly, nodding very slightly. Then, she met his eyes, the full force of their father's willpower in her look.

"It's that commander, isn't it? The spectre."

"Yes, Sol," he said. "Shepard. The one that we all owe our lives to."

Another silence as his sister sized him up.

"You can't be serious, Gar."

"I am, Solana."

"Don't you think this is taking hero-worship a little far?"

Her voice was scathing, cutting right through his composure, and he couldn't help himself. He snarled, leaning forward suddenly in his seat.

"Damn it, Sol, that's not what this is about. She's… She's important to me. She wasn't just my commanding officer, she was my friend. I owe her my life. I don't know how to explain it, but _she's it_."

Solana's look was calculating, thoughtful. She listened to what he had to say, watched the flare of his mandibles and the glint of his eye as he said it. She straightened slightly in her seat before she spoke again.

"Is this really what you want, Garrus? This isn't a casual thing – you want her to be your… your mate?"

Garrus nodded, all the intensity of his love for Shepard in his eyes and in his voice when he responded:

"Yes. More than anything."

Sol nodded.

"I'll try to prepare Dad. Warn him so he has some time to deal with it before you come home."

"Thanks, Sol. It means a lot."

She said nothing, just nodded again.

"Sol? Keep an open mind, please. I think you'll really like her, when you meet her."

"Okay," Sol said. "If she's your mate, then I'll accept her. I can't promise the same for Dad, but I'll do what I can."

"Thanks."

"See you next week, Gar. Good luck."

She disconnected the call, and Garrus was left to stare at the blank screen. It could have been worse, but _Spirits,_ he did not want to think about how things might go when he arrived at his father's house, arm-in-arm with a human – and a spectre, no less.

He pushed his lunch away and pulled up a document on his datapad. Best to keep busy until then.

**Shepard**

Shepard and Liara peered over the console in Liara's office together as the _Normandy's_ scanner took in data from the small, scorched rock of a planet below: Paravin.

The previous planet they had visited had proved interesting – a magnetic field created extensive radio interference, but Liara had quantum communicators to cut through it. The interference would shroud her in secrecy from at least most prying eyes, and Han was a relatively quiet system. They were off to a good start, and Shepard hoped that Paravin would prove to be another valid option.

The data was spreading across the screen as it came in. Shepard pointed to a line as scrolled into existence.

"There. There's a permanent temperate zone between the light side and the dark side. It's a suitable temperature range where you could set up an outpost."

"Hidden in the twilight band. I like it," Liara smiled.

The tidally-locked planet appeared to have no resources of value, at least none that the scanners were detecting, which would keep it off the radar of most corporations and governments. Add another one to the list of likely suspects.

Another line of data materialized on the screen.

"What's that?" Liara asked.

"An unmanned space station in orbit," Shepard replied. She considered the data again, and then recalled: "We've actually come across this before – on the first _Normandy._ We recovered one of Matriarch Dilinaga's writings."

"Ah, yes," Liara nodded.

"Other than that, it was completely empty. Do you think you could use it? Make it look like it's still empty?"

Liara bit her lip, her brow furrowed in thought, "I suppose. We could also use it to distract – leave it empty."

Shepard considered this. Its emptiness might convince those seeking that it was simply space junk, distracting them from the headquarters on the barren planet below. But it was a risk.

Liara shifted, scratching her hair tentacles absent-mindedly.

"This is all good, Shepard. This will help me find somewhere discreet, hidden in plain sight. The mass relay traffic does concern me, though. Perhaps one of the systems – "

A shudder like an earthquake and a deep rumbling boom rocked the _Normandy_, cutting Liara off midsentence. They both clutched at the console as the shaking threatened to topple them.

"We're under fire," Shepard said.

Joker's voice came over the comm: "Brace for evasive maneuvers! They took a chunk out of our shields, and I'll be damned if I let 'em do it again."

"Shields are at seventy five percent," EDI clarified.

Shepeard scrambled towards the door, shouting over her shoulder.

"Liara, sit down and strap in. We'll get back to this."

For a brief moment, the look in her friend's eyes caught at something inside her, tugging at the tense coil that seemed to be wound around the deepest part of her.

_She prepped the distress beacon as the _Normandy_ trembled. Heat seeped into her suit from the flames that cast a shaky yellow glow against the silver walls. Ashley's voice urged her to move quickly. She could hear the fear, but also the steely soldier beneath._

"_Get everyone onto the escape shuttles," she urged Ashley, and was faced with a stubborn stare as the lieutenant crossed her arms and squared her stance._

_Joker. Joker wouldn't leave, Ashley was saying, and neither would she. The heat spiked. The adrenaline pushed her forward._

_She could hear Joker's voice now, sending a call for help, a plea for the _Normandy_ to make it through. But she knew… the _Normandy_ was dead. And she'd be damned if she lost anyone else today._

No. No, damn it. They were coming out in one piece, this time, and she couldn't promise the same for whoever had taken it upon themselves to fire on the _Normandy_. She turned on her heel and sprinted to the elevator, riding it up to the CIC. The doors opened and she bolted for the command center console.

Another direct hit rocked the _Normandy._

"Shit!" Shepard hissed, clinging to the console to steady herself.

She slammed her hand down on the comm button, broadcasting ship-wide.

"Action stations, everyone. We're under attack. I repeat, unknown vessel firing on us. Lieutenant Ness, I want you on the main gun. _Now."_

She made her way up to the cockpit, clambering as Joker banked the ship in a steep dive. She pulled her way into the room, strapping herself into the co-pilot's seat.

"How the _hell_ did they know we were here?" she shouted to Joker, who hands were flying wildly across the control console, flying the ship with the skill and dexterity he was known for.

"I don't know, Commander, but I'm gonna get us the hell out of here."

The _Normandy _surged up again, performing a sharp looping action. They curved to the side, arcing around the attacking ship. Shepard leaned forward as the ship filled the main window, examining it closely, despite the G-forces tugging at her stomach and pulling the blood away from her head.

The white streaks of the thanix cannon banded across the view, slamming the ship squarely. A war whoop came over the comm – Tara.

"That ship's batarian," Shepard said.

_Maybe pirates? Slavers? What the hell do they want with the _Normandy_? _

The thanix cannon fired again – this time, Shepard registered the low, sharp hum of the guns releasing – and the batarian ship shuddered with a solid hit as the _Normandy _passed over it.

_Yeah, Tara!_ She silently cheered on the new member of the crew.

And how had they found them? The only beings that had technology capable of tracking or detecting the _Normandy_ with its stealth capabilities had been the reapers. She shuddered at the thought.

Inertia tugged back at her as the _Normandy_ picked up speed. Joker was giving it everything he had.

"Sixty seconds to relay, Commander," he shouted over the roar of the engines and the intermittent thrumming of the cannon.

Shepard inched forward in her chair, alertness in each nerve. She absorbed every sound over the comm, every shift in the sky outside as they moved at high speeds, every twitch of Joker's fingers over the control panel.

EDI's calm voice informed her that the shields were depleting, but there had been no hull damage yet.

Joker's frantic shout told her they were thirty seconds out from the relay.

Tara's war whoop filled her with confidence that they had landed another square hit, even as they retreated.

"Fifteen seconds!"

Another shuddering hit knocked her against the armrests, and Joker was counting down.

"Ten… nine… eight…"

"Shields are at ten percent, Shepard."

"Seven… six… five… four…"

"_Nailed 'em again!"_

'Three… Two… One!"

And then they were jumping away, the _Normandy _enveloped in the blue haze of the relay travel. Blue bled into black, and they came to a hurtling stop in another system.

Quiet. Shepard didn't dare to breathe for a moment. Waiting.

Joker glanced at her, a question in his eyes, which she answered with a raised finger. The whole ship seemed to be holding its breath, waiting to exhale. A peaceful hum surrounded them – the ship's usual thrumming augmented by the recharging shields.

Nothing. Yet. But she wasn't going to risk it.

"Joker, jump us back to the Citadel."

"Yes ma'am," he replied, directing the ship back around precisely into the relay.

And just as they were lining up their jump, the batarian ship soared through the relay, bolting away from them, not realizing they had turned around.

"They're tracking us," Shepard realized.

"Jumping in ten… nine… eight…"

Not until the blue haze filled the window again did Shepard relax, unclenching her hands from the armrests. She stood, crossing to the comm link in the CIC to address the crew.

"Good work, everyone," she said, feeling the calm, collected tone seep back into her voice. "This mission is being cut short. We've set a course for the Citadel, and we are going to remain grounded until we can figure out how we were tracked. When we dock, everyone is to remain onboard until the _Normandy_ is thoroughly inspected. Shepard out."

She stepped away, crossing her arms over her chest and biting her lower lip. She didn't like any of the implications of this scenario. Either someone had found a weakness in the _Normandy's_ stealth technology, or there was someone on board feeding their coordinates to someone who wanted to kill them.

_Or, the reapers aren't actually gone_, another, quiet voice whispered to her.

No. She couldn't believe that. She didn't want to. But she couldn't help the fear that rose up in her.

She retreated to her cabin. Until they arrived at the Citadel, she needed to think. There must be something she was missing.


	14. Violated

Author's Note: Sorry for the wait on this one, guys! But it's a long one to make up for it. Also, starting now, I'm going to be updating every two weeks instead of every week. My classes have officially started and they're burying me in work, so I won't be able to write as much in a given week. Thank you so much for continuing to follow my work and read and review - I love all my loyal readers! Thank you also to my amazing beta for holding me to high standards :)

Bioware owns everything (and I haven't played the Extended Cut yet, but fingers crossed! No spoilers, please!).

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 14: "Violated"<strong>

**Liara**

No sooner had the ship stopped rocking from the repeated impacts than Liara was at her terminal, reaching out to every remaining agent she had. That she hadn't been aware of this attack before it happened worried her. She knew her team had been decimated by the reapers – no less than the rest of the galaxy – but she should have seen this coming!

…somehow. She knew the expectation verged on absurd, but what good was being the Shadow Broker if you couldn't stay on top of these things? If you couldn't protect yourself or your friends?

Shepard quickly briefed her on the details. The ship had been batarian – and though Joker had shaken them off and they were headed back to the Citadel on the most direct jump-path possible, she wasn't sure how they had been followed. Liara contacted everyone she could in her spy network, with a special emphasis on those agents planted in batarian circles. She would need to get more people on the inside, she knew. Most of her Hegemony informants had died when the Alpha relay destroyed Aratoht, and the rest when the reapers arrived.

One of her batarian agents messaged her back immediately. He was on the Citadel, and he had his ears to the ground with the batarian refugees there. He had passed her information the prior week that had been vague at best. Some refugees had taken to frequent, private meetings, and he was trying to break into the group.

_No success yet, but I will redouble my efforts,_ he wrote.

They would be back on the Citadel in under twelve hours. Perhaps not enough time for him to get the information she needed. She didn't even know if this would prove to be related. But when people knew what to look for, the search usually progressed faster.

Again, she lamented that she had so few eyes and ears in the field. That had been the entire point of this mission, and there was a small part of her that feared that the target had been the Shadow Broker, not Shepard.

A ping on her omni-tool pulled her immediately to attention. She read the new message, from a different agent – this one a vorcha in batarian space.

_Intercepted a message. Not much detail. See below._

The message was coded – the identities carefully disguised – but the meaning was clear. There was a tracker onboard the _Normandy _– brought aboard unwillingly by none other than Shepard herself.

**Shepard**

Hackett crossed his arms and regarded them seriously. The holograph flickered a little, but his solemn stare held steady.

Liara linked arms with Shepard, her calming effect radiating through her, but not softening Shepard's own hard pose. She felt the anxious, twitching apprehension stiffen the fibers of her muscles.

"Nanotechnology?" Hackett repeated. "Doctor T'Soni, how did it end up in Shepard's system?"

"Well, I can't say conclusively, but ingestion is the most likely scenario," Liara addressed the admiral calmly. "The nanobots could have been slipped into food or drink. They would be undetectable. This technology is advanced – extremely refined. I've never seen anything like it."

"When did this happen?" Hackett asked, this time focusing on Shepard.

"I don't know," Shepard confessed. "I'll make a log of my actions this week – see where I might have left something unattended."

Hackett's eyes seemed to bore through her. She felt like a child squirming under a parent's judgment. There was something about the serious air that followed Hackett around – it made her feel like she was back in her first week of basic.

"Admiral Hackett, this technology doesn't have an expiration date. It's based on medical technology meant to treat chronic diseases – the nanobots can last for years inside human bodies."

"So this could have happened anytime in… in the last few _years?"_ Shepard asked, shocked.

For her, that was technically any time in her life – since Cerberus rebuilt her. It was a terrifying thought, and the possibility of such a long time frame significantly complicated the issue. Was this a coincidence? A way the Illusive Man had kept track of her that the batarians were now taking advantage of?

Liara met her eyes: "Well, technically, yes, I suppose. But this technology is recent. I would say months."

"Still, that doesn't narrow the field much," Shepard replied.

"Yes," Hackett said thoughtfully. "Make a log as far back as you can, Captain. I'll have a team look into it."

"I'm more concerned about getting these things out of me," Shepard replied.

"It will take a transfusion," Liara said. "There are procedures designed for removing or replacing similar medical technology in case of malfunction. Doctor Chakwas would be more than capable, and we have all the necessary equipment in the med bay."

"How long will it take?"

"A few hours."

"What about my crew?" she turned back to Hackett. She wanted to offer something to them – knowledge, an explanation, even an order.

"My team is on their way already," Hackett said. "We've opened an investigation – they will speak to every member of the _Normandy's_ crew. I know you trust your crew, but – "

She held back a sigh, knowing he was right: "You can't be too careful. And you're right, Admiral – I trust them. I hope they can help the investigation."

"As do I, Captain."

Liara squeezed her arm gently.

"Now, " Hackett shifted, and Shepard thought she saw the ghost of a cynical smile on his craggy face, "I have a call to make to the Hegemony. I'll keep you in the loop."

"Thank you, sir. And good luck."

"You, too, Captain. Hackett out."

When the hologram's artificial light had dimmed, Shepard turned to Liara.

"Let's get these _things_ out of me," she grimaced. "And I need to call Garrus."

Liara cocked her head to the side, and Shepard could feel her penetrating look as if it were a hand against her skin.

"He'll be worried," Liara said softly.

"Yeah."

The word was almost a grunt. But the truth was… _she_ was worried.

**Garrus**

"A council Spectre interfered in our matters. Shepard not only aided the geth – who have been the scourge of the galaxy for hundreds of years – but gave them access to Reaper technology!" Xen's imperious voice was cold even through the static of the hologram. "She bolstered the geth and made them stronger than ever. We are simply asking for the opportunity to restore the balance."

The council had granted the Quarian Admiralty a meeting, and while the other council members had been surprised to see only two quarian faces (so to speak) on the other end of the holographic projector, Garrus had simply smiled grimly.

He knew enough of Gerrel and Xen to expect no more of them. They were discontented with the compromise Shepard had struck between the geth and the quarians, and they wanted blood. Or coolant fluid – whatever it was that ran through geth piping. He didn't claim to be an expert: reapers were his thing.

Not that reaper expertise had any relevance anymore.

The two helmets regarded them – their mirrored surfaces deflecting any scrutiny Garrus could throw their way. Xen's cold voice spread across the room and Garrus could nearly see a supercilious eyebrow raised at him above those glowing eyes. Granted, this was all speculation. Rumor had it the quarians were beginning to ease out of their suits, but he had yet to ever see one.

He wondered how Tali was doing. His left mandible twitched in amusement at the thought of her temper flaring up at Xen and Gerrel's behavior. She may be the youngest admiral, but she had lost her naivety and he knew the string of quarian curse words that would be flying from her lips if he had the privilege of being there when she learned about this meeting.

"The quarians have done our part to aid the galaxy. We have earned our position back, and we need the council's help to finally rid the galaxy of the geth threat."

This time, it was Gerrel who spoke to the council, crossing his arms in what Garrus knew was a haughty gesture.

"Our place was taken from us unjustly. The _council_ Spectre Shepard has interfered with our rights by siding with the geth. We will right that wrong, which will make us responsible for ending two synthetic threats against the galaxy's safety."

Aethyta raised an eyebrow at that and replied dryly:

"And your great heroism merits a council position."

"Of course," Xen replied. "The barbarian krogan involvement was far less than our own. The council cannot deny our wisdom and experience. And after the council interfered and prevented us from destroying the geth, you can no longer deny us a position based on our part in creating the geth 300 years ago."

"_You_ asked for help! You went to Shepard directly, not to the council, to ask her to help you when you were losing the war _you_ started against the geth."

Aethyta shot him a look at his outburst. He took a deep breath – he did not regret what he'd said. He knew Xen and Gerrel's patterns. They were troublemakers – and he did not tolerate their kind of irresponsibility. Even in his simple, naïve days as a C-Sec officer, he'd had a short fuse whenever he was dealing with this kind of moron. He huffed and crossed his arms – a formerly-human gesture that had now become a universal expression of disdain in the galaxy.

"Shepard defied council protocol when she allowed the geth platform Legion to transmit reaper technology to the rest of the geth collective," Gerrel's snide reply was directed at Garrus. "She made them stronger, and yet she is still allowed to run about with the council's full authority behind her."

"You're conveniently leaving out the part of this story when you defied your own Admiralty's orders to fire upon a geth ship not only after you'd heard that it had disabled its weapons, but also while Shepard was still aboard, along with another quarian Admiral."

Sati's eyes widened at that, and her head snapped back to the hologram, fixing the two quarians with an expression of shock.

"Yes," Garrus continued, addressing Sati directly, but shooting a pointed look at the habitually-stubborn Adreon. "Admiral Tali-Zorah vas _Normandy_, now vas Rannoch, who is a hero of the Battle of the Citadel and fought at the Battle for Earth was aboard the ship when Gerrel attempted to destroy it. He showed recklessness and a lack of consideration for the lives that would be lost at his rash actions. Why should we listen to him or even consider his proposition? He has proven that he lacks judgment."

Yeah, he was getting pretty good at this. He let a little tendril of pride arise at the realization that he'd made an argument without letting his temper get in the way.

"The geth were working with the reapers," Adreon countered. "The quarians had reason to take every precaution in eliminating the geth threat."

"Every precaution?" Garrus felt his fringe lift slightly, pluming out in his anger.

Aethyta held a hand up to stop him from another outburst, and instead turned her substantial ferocity on the salarian.

"They put the entire galaxy at risk by provoking the geth. It's my understanding that the geth turned to the reapers after the quarians attacked, as an act of desperation."

Adreon returned Aethyta and Garrus's icy glares with one of his own. Sati frowned pensively.

"We must discuss this amongst ourselves," she said to Gerrel and Xen. "We will inform you when we have come to a ruling."

After a short, tense silence, the connection was severed. Sati turned slowly to face the three councilors, frozen in their standoff.

"I have to be honest. I don't have a good feeling about those two."

Garrus glanced over at his human counterpart:

"Trust those instincts," he said. "Those two are no good. I suggest we hold off on a decision until we've heard from the rest of the Admirals. Shala'Raan, Zaal'Koris, and Tali'Zorah have good heads on their shoulders. They've made wise decisions and been powerful allies in the struggle against the reapers. Their input is valuable."

"If they can prove they can control their fellow admirals, I would be willing to re-admit the quarians as a council race," Aethyta agreed. "I'm not sure about adding a new councilor. Their relationship with the geth has not been tested yet, and I'm not sure I want to be the one to stir up that hornet's nest."

"The geth are more reasonable than we've been lead to believe," Garrus said. "Maybe even more reasonable than the quarians."

_I hope that doesn't get back to Tali,_ he thought. _She'll have my head._

"Can you really say that? They tried to wipe the quarians out entirely. Almost succeeded, too!"

He opened his mouth to reply to Sati when he noticed Teanna standing just outside the glass doors to the conference room. She was fidgeting, her motions agitated. She looked conflicted about interrupting, but the stress in her body language sent a chill down his back. He gestured for her to come in.

"Councilor Vakarian," she said, her voice wavering. "It's – it's your… you have a video call from… from Captain Shepard."

The chill intensified, gripping his bones and putting every muscle on edge.

"Excuse me," he said, following Teanna out of the room. He felt Aethyta's keen gaze on his back as the door closed behind him.

Teanna produced a portable video feed and activated it.

"Do you wish to be alone?" she asked as the call connected.

"Yes," he said, tersely, then softened his voice, grimacing at his own gruffness. "Please."

She nodded and vanished around a corner as Shepard's face materialized. It was paler than usual, he noticed with dread, and she let out a heavy breath as she began to explain to him what had happened.

If he thought his muscles had tensed before, it was nothing compared with the tightness that ran from his shoulders to the tips of his clenched hands as Shepard told him about the batarian ship that had attacked her. When she explained the nanotechnology in her blood, he ceased to feel anything but the thudding of his own heart. He knew he should be grateful that all they did was track her, when they could have fed her anything…

"Hackett's speaking with the Hegemony now, I believe," she concluded. "I'll be back on the Citadel in a couple of hours, but I'll have to stay on the _Normandy _while Liara and Doctor Chakwas finish cleaning out my blood."

She made a face at the last phrase. He understood immediately. It was one thing to have your blood spilled in battle – another entirely to have it sucked out in tubes and meddled with. The thought that there was already something foreign and insidious in her veins made his skin crawl empathetically.

"I'll be there as soon as you land," he said.

She nodded: "I know. I'll let you know if I hear from Hackett before then."

They locked gazes for a moment – he searched her eyes and saw her usual stubbornness, weariness, and a touch a fear that twisted at his gut. But she blinked as he held her gaze and he saw trust as well. She was in good hands, he knew. He just wished they were his hands.

"Tell Liara she'd better know what she's doing," he said.

"She does, Garrus," she reassured him with her steady, calm voice. "I'll be in one piece when we land. I promise."

"Good."

"I'll see you soon," she said.

He nodded, holding his hand up to the screen as she mirrored the gesture – his hand engulfing the image of her tiny one.

Then she was gone.

A rustling behind him gave away Aethyta's presence, and her gruff voice soon followed.

"I had heard that there was more to you two than just," she cleared her throat with a cheeky _ahem_ sound and concluded: "partners."

"That's irrelevant," Garrus said.

"I'm not criticizing," she said. "Trust me, I come from an unconventional home. People should love whoever they want to love. But it's far from irrelevant."

He looked up at her, and saw that she was smiling at him – a sly twist of the lips that hinted at a wink.

"Follow up with your quarian friend. Gerrel and Xen can wait for our decision. It would do them some good to learn a little patience, don't you think?"

He grunted his agreement.

"We'll wait to hear from the rest of the admirals," she continued. "But it sounds to me like you were just called away on important business. I'll call a recess and we'll reconvene later."

"Thank you," he said, catching the twinkle in her brown eye as she turned away.

Hours later, when the _Normandy_ had landed and he had clucked absurdly over Shepard in the med bay to his satisfaction, the call from Hackett finally came in. The Hegemony claimed no knowledge of the attack and disavowed any connection with the ship that had tracked and fired on the _Normandy._

"Like hell they're not involved," he growled after Hackett hung up.

"Yeah, my thoughts precisely. I'm not exactly the Hegemony's favorite person, and I doubt the batarian ship was a coincidence."

Shepard shifted on the med bay cot as she replied, with an irritated flick of her eyes at the IV tubing running from her arm, cleaning the nanotech out of her blood.

"Any idea when they might have slipped it to you?"

"It must have been on the Citadel. Hackett hasn't officially cleared the crew, but…"

"Yeah."

He reached out and took her small hand and wrapped its too many long fingers inside his palm. It was cool and soft against the pads of his fingers.

"Garrus," she said, tipping his chin up with her other hand to meet his eyes. "I'm okay."

"I know," he said. "But I'm going to have C-Sec look into it."

"Garrus, you don't have to – "

"If it happened on the Citadel, it's C-Sec's jurisdiction," he said sharply. He realized he was being short with her, but right now her safety was more important. "You're a Spectre – technically I could authorize a Spectre to look into it…"

"Trust me, a Spectre _will_ be looking into it."

She grinned, and he matched it, twitching a mandible in amusement. He felt himself relax a little, relieved to hear some lightness in her voice. He squeezed her hand.

"Good," he said, his voice dry, "Someone needs to take them down. I have a feeling that Hegemony warrant for their arrest is purely myth."

"The batarians are always saying they'll crack down on the criminals in their midst. They tend to get their panties in a knot when someone else tries to do that job for them," Shepard shook her head. "But in my experience, they're either incompetent or lying."

The doors slid open and Doctor Chakwas re-entered the clinic, a glass of water in her hand. She handed the glass to Shepard, who gulped it down gratefully.

"I hope you're not upsetting my patient, Garrus," the doctor said, giving him a warm wink and a clap on the shoulder.

"Very much so," Shepard teased.

"I wouldn't dream of it, doctor," he replied.

A pensive look came over Shepard's face suddenly, smoothing her cheeks and wrinkling her forehead. As Chakwas checked the machines, Shepard leaned in and spoke with a quiet voice, her breath soft on his shoulder.

"You know, I had lunch on the Citadel yesterday. There was a rather unpleasant batarian there."

"Is there any other kind?" he retorted, but he kept his focus on her, knowing there was more going on in her head.

"Not that I'm aware of. Anyway, he seemed to recognize me. And he wasn't happy about it."

"You think he slipped the nanobots in your food?"

She frowned more, and he could practically see her thoughts swirling in the colored discs of her bright eyes.

"Unlikely. I could see him from where I was sitting – he didn't leave his seat once in the whole meal. He was staring daggers at me – I would have noticed. But it's a good place to start."

"You going to go talk to them?"

"Yeah," she said, her voice determined. "I'm not about to sit back and let someone else investigate. This is what I do."

"Ever considered a career in C-Sec?" He joked, nudging her arm lightly.

"I'm a Spectre, Vakarian. I'm way past C-Sec."

He laughed, wrapping an arm around her shoulder as she rested her head against his collar. Her hair tickled his neck gently.

"You'll let me know if you want me to come with you?"

"Thanks, Garrus, but I can handle this."

"But if you do?"

"I'll let you know. I promise."

**Tali**

The sun was setting in a brilliant orange haze over the craggy peaks, the light spreading warmly across the glass of the window. She sat cross-legged in front of the large window that she had placed in the receiving room of her home. Her first house.

The looseness of her hair around her shoulders was foreign to her. The gentle brush of dry, desert air against her skin felt frighteningly free. It was thrilling, exhilarating, and strangely uncomfortable.

Here, in the environment of their homeworld, quarians were beginning to remove their suits for short periods. Phalanx, the geth that had been uploaded into Tali's suit, had been running her immune system through the paces, and here on Rannoch – a place untouched by civilizations for three hundred years – she felt safe enough to expose herself to the elements. At least for a little while, here and there.

It was all very bizarre. She felt vulnerable without her helmet and the close pressure of the suit environment. And the mystifying sense of affection she was starting to develop for Phalanx tugged at her expectations. If someone had told her three years ago that she would be living side-by-side with the geth, she would have laughed at the stupid bosh'tet.

Everything Shepard had done – everything she had invited Tali to be a part of – it challenged her sense of self, slowly molding her into someone else. Well, perhaps not someone else. She felt the corners of her lips lift as she thought about the woman she had grown to be.

No, this is who she always was. She had been limited by her fears, her prejudices, and the cramped, oppressive environment of the flotilla. The way the galaxy had changed in a scant three years amazed her. It had opened her people up to great possibilities. Perhaps they would once again be a great civilization – one that learned from its mistakes. Perhaps they would be more accepting.

_Right,_ a wry voice in her head sneered. _You're off to a great start, pissing off the council and grabbing for power within weeks of reclaiming Rannoch. Keelah, if only I could do something about Xen and Gerrel. I'd like to hack their suits so their voice boxes malfunction._

A knock on the door brought her back to the present. She opened the main door, welcoming Auntie Raan into her sparsely-decorated home.

The construction team had finished building it only days ago, and aside from a few storage boxes and a bed in Tali's room, it was still empty. The ceilings vaulted over the empty, pillared room, giving it more the feel of a temple than a home.

Perhaps it was a temple, in a way. It was her monument to Rannoch. One day, it would be a home. She would marry and populate the place with little dark-haired children who would fill the rooms with laughter and toys. Then, it would really be a home. But for now, it was her temple.

"Tali," Raan said, placing a cool hand on Tali's face. "What a lovely woman you are."

She took Raan's hand in her own, marveling at the first glimpse of her aunt's face. How strange it was to see the face of someone you loved for the first time. She had known Raan her entire life, and yet this face was strange. Warm, inviting, loving. But foreign.

"Thank you, Auntie Raan," Tali said sincerely, giving the woman a hug. "Please, make yourself at home."

"Admiral Koris will be here shortly. I thought I would come early to see my little Tali."

Raan had chosen to continue wearing her suit, but with the mask removed. Tali removed her own suit from a storage box and stepped into her room to put it on, calling through the door to her aunt.

"I'm glad to see you, Auntie."

"As am I. But we have difficult things to discuss today."

"Xen and Gerrel," Tali said, emerging from her room with her suit zipped snugly around her, her hair tucked neatly into the scarf. Like her aunt, she decided to keep her mask off. This would take time, but she was determined to adjust.

"Yes," Raan said. "I worry what they might do. The fact that they approached the council without consulting the rest of the Admiralty…"

"I don't like it either."

"We must not lose our unity, Tali. For so long, it was all we had. Order, loyalty to our culture, our fleet. It was what held us together. It is why we survived. We cannot lose it."

"Agreed."

Tali had a feeling that Admiral Koris would agree with them, but she felt the cold, clammy hand of fear clench around her stomach. Xen and Gerrel were headstrong, and had proved to be more than minor annoyances in the past year. Gerrel had even fired on a geth ship while Tali had been aboard with Shepard.

She was not going to let that one go.

Raan was right. The identity and the future of their people depended on the Admiralty's leadership. How could they regain their homeworld, only to lose everything that made them _quarian?_ It would not happen under her watch, that was for sure.

She, Raan, and Koris would have to come up with a plan – an approach to the council that would be better received. If they presented a thoughtful alternative to Xen and Gerrel's harsh demands, perhaps they could salvage the council's view of the quarians.

The last thing she wanted was for them to become like the batarians: bitter, cruel, angry, and fearful.

Raan laid a hand on Tali's shoulder, drawing her out of her analysis.

"It will be alright, Tali. We will show them that they can respect us."

Tali nodded. She hoped her aunt was right.

**Shepard**

_Dark. The hallway was dark. Slick, black walls loomed, dripping shadows. _

_There – ahead: a door. She slid along the wall, back pressing against the icy metal. Cold, heavy dread hung in her abdomen. She looked up into the gaping wound where the door parted from the wall. The red-brown dust of the asteroid seeped into the slick metal of the corridor._

_Outside, there was no air. Sounds came muffled, tinny, and echoing to her ears. _

_She looked up. The mass relay loomed – gargantuan in the black-red sky. The stars in the distance distorted and warped against the massive, pulsing light. It drew closer, closer, ever closer._

_A voice cried out behind her. Low, angry, bitter. More voices echoed. She knew they were coming after her – closing the distance. _

_She tried calling the _Normandy_, but there was nothing but numb silence over the comms. No static, even, to fill the void. The voices drew closer._

_She looked over her shoulder at the encroaching mob. Four eyes on each face. Row after row of gaping nostrils, flaring in anger – hatred. Then, suddenly, looks of surprise crossed each and every face. They contemplated her, terrible, twisted grins spreading their thin lips._

_She wanted to ask what was so strange, that they would stop pursuing and simply smile, but she found she didn't have the breath. A deep gasp – and her lungs filled with burning nothingness._

_Adrift. Her feet rose from the ground as she choked on nothing, floating away into the stars. She felt she was being ripped apart from the inside. The tiny blades of oxygen deprivation pricked at her eyes, her throat, the cavity inside her ribs. Panic rose up, and the stinging pains intensified._

_The batarians began to laugh as she struggled against her own end, writhing at the fire that burned inside her parched lungs. Unmoored, untethered, she felt herself pulling further and further from solid ground, and still there was silence. Silence from the _Normandy,_ silence from her crushed lungs and strangled throat, and silence from the audience that watched her impassively as she died._

The sheets tangled tightly around her body, clammy and smelling of salt from her sweat. The deep, gnawing fear in her belly gripped at her, holding her under the sway of the dream even as reality rematerialized around her. Her thrashing had wrapped the fabric of the sheets tightly around her arms and midsection, pinning her claustrophobically and leaving Garrus exposed to the night air.

But he didn't seem worried about catching a chill. He leaned over her, his hands warm on her shoulders and his eyes sharp and clouded at the same time as his firm grip held her steady.

He was saying something, asking her if she was alright. His voice sounded far off – as if he were calling from deep space – in a soundless vacuum. She blinked and let the sleep fall away, until his words were clear.

"Bad dream?" he asked, when her eyes met his. She saw the edge in the blue irises, and noticed the way he held her firmly, but gently. He carefully peeled the covers away, wrapping her instead in his embrace. She felt the claustrophobia ebb away in the comfort of his muscles surrounding hers.

She couldn't find the words to explain to him the way the fear had impaled her, paralyzing her and compressing her lungs. She gasped for breath even now, knowing it had been a trick of her own betraying mind.

"Garrus."

It was the only word that came to her, and he pulled her close to him, breathing warm and soft against her forehead.

"It's okay," he said, his breath rustling her hair: he smelled musky and real and safe.

She felt the heaving of her chest calm and subside – skin against leathery skin. The peaceful darkness of their apartment was beginning to reach her through the sweaty terror of her nightmare.

"You haven't had a dream like that since Earth," Garrus commented quietly as her shoulders finally rose and fell in their usual steady rhythm. She knew him well enough to sense the carefully guarded alarm that edged his voice.

"I know," she replied, not knowing what else to say.

He didn't need to hear more, though. She remained pressed against his chest, his breath stirring her hair like a warm breeze and her hands closing gently around his fingers. Although she couldn't see his face, she knew his eyes remained on her, scanning her, sensing her fear. As her body relaxed, she felt his do the same, until her breathing fell into a steady, slow rhythm and he drew her closer with a sigh.

She felt him return to sleep a short while later, but she remained awake, eyes wide in the dark, carefully regulating her breathing to be slow, steady, and calm, even if her thoughts couldn't be more the opposite.


	15. Palaven Bound

Author's Note: Ok I have a number of things to discuss today.

1. I played and reviewed the Extended Cut DLC. Check it out - link in my profile.

2. Re: the Extended Cut, I am debating doing a major overhaul of this fic. (SPOILER ALERT - skip to item #3 if you don't want EC DLC spoilers). I was thinking of rewriting this to fit with the refusal ending. Shepard becomes the leader of the Resistance as they fight the reapers. The reapers target her, trying to take her out, since she was the first to ever stand before them and defy them. Here are my thoughts. First option: I rewrite the whole thing starting now - wipe it clean and put up chapters on a weekly or bi-weekly basis from chapter one on. Second option: I finish this story as it is and rewrite it later. Third option: I fart around with a re-write and post it at random as a second, alternate fic. Let me know, my lovely readers!

EDIT: the response was almost totally unanimous, so here's the deal. This fic will remain the same, updated every two weeks, and I'll play around with the rewrite, which I'll post separately and not nearly as frequently (cause, you know, I have a life). Look for it soon(ish). And thank you guys for all humoring me and my radical ideas :)

3. I try to keep my physical and gameplay details for my Shep as minimal as possible so as not to alienate anyone who has a much different Femshep. But I need to clarify for the sake of this chapter: she is a Colonist and mostly-paragon. You will never learn her first name or her appearance (aside from the fact that she's built, cause she's a soldier...). Just wanted to put that out there in case anyone morally objects to Colonist paragon Sheps ;)

Love you all! Enjoy the chapter.

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 15: "Palaven-Bound"<strong>

**Shepard **

The clinking of utensils and serving-ware was usually a sound she liked. It reminded her of the busy mess halls at basic and the team eating dinner together after a tough mission. It was a sound that felt like home to her – every culture came together over food. It was the great unifier.

But today, the sounds were putting her only more on edge. She felt her senses heightened, but feared the din in the background would drown out relevant noises. The sound of a gun being released from its holster – that subtle clicking noise – could be too quiet for her to hear.

And so it was with her skin crawling and her nerves just one twitch away from pulling her pistol that she approached the manager of the presidium restaurant where she suspected she had been tagged. Like an animal. She felt the urge to growl and wondered if perhaps she'd been spending too much time with Garrus.

The manager, a surprisingly stout asari, approached her with fingers clasped together, her hair tentacles flat against her head. Shepard sighed inwardly. She really wasn't a fan of being recognized. She would much prefer to fly under the radar.

"How can I be of service?" the asari smiled widely as she stopped in front of Shepard.

"Could we speak in private?" Shepard began, feeling instantly conspicuous, exposed here in the middle of the restaurant.

"Of course," the asari said, leading her back to a small office near the restaurant entrance.

Once the door was closed, the asari took a seat at her desk, gesturing to an empty chair for Shepard. She chose not to sit, instead pacing behind the chair. Still on edge. The asari gave her a suspicious look.

"Was there something amiss with your meal?" she asked.

"You could say that," Shepard murmured. "Who was working here that day? I need to know not only who served me that meal, but who cooked it and who else could have had access to it."

The asari shifted in her seat. "I – I could put together a list. Why do you need this information? I apologize if there was something wrong with your meal. I can offer you a voucher…"

"Trust me, this doesn't have to do with food quality, but I can't explain all the details. This is a classified Spectre investigation. I'll need that list, now."

**Garrus**

He had found her bent over a datapad when he got home that evening, scouring a list of suspects and sending the information to Liara to cross-reference with her database. She looked tired, her eyes weary and her shoulders hunched, so he had pulled her away from her work with caresses and soft words in her ear – revenge for her behavior the other night. Sweet revenge, he mused, as they drifted to sleep in the tangled sheets.

He woke when she jerked suddenly, tugged out of sleep by some horrific scene playing behind her eyes. She panted, her shoulders heaving and her skin sticky with sweat. He didn't bother with words. They both knew what was transpiring in her, so he simply pulled her close, soothing her by stroking her cool, bare skin.

"I'm sorry," she whispered, eventually. "I didn't mean to wake you."

He just shook his head and pulled her in closer. She never needed to apologize. He wanted to be the one who squeezed away the fears with a strong embrace. Always.

When her breathing finally slowed and evened out, no longer ragged and startled, she began to shift in his arms. She glanced at the time on her omni-tool and sighed.

"Well, we need to be at the docking bay in two hours, anyway. Might as well get up."

He released her from his arms and watched her graceful, alien figure unfold itself and cross to the closet.

He had only been half-joking when he had used turian pick-up lines on her back on their first night together. Her waist really _was_ very… supportive. He watched her now as she dressed, the firm musculature of her thighs rounding up to her hips and culminating in a sleek, compact waist. He had felt the muscles beneath her skin and knew that they were coiled, ready to spring at any point. He also knew that the ideal for beauty in a human female was softer, more slender and _delicate_.He shook his head at the thought. _Foolish_. He liked her just as she was. Powerful. Strong. Stubborn.

As if she'd overheard his musings, she turned around, shrugging her Alliance uniform shirt over her shoulders and beginning to button it. Fine, web-like scars traced over her collarbone and down to her stomach. Battle scars, emphasizing the strength of that _supportive_ waist, and the strength of the woman inside.

"The doctors on Earth did good work," he said.

She glanced down her own body and nodded.

"Yeah, Doctor Chakwas said she was really pleased with it," she replied, and finished buttoning the top. She reached for her uniform pants, neatly folded in a drawer. "She actually said she couldn't have done better herself."

"That's quite a compliment from her," he said.

Shepard nodded, and a ghost of a smile crossed her face. He felt that specter lighten his heart. He was glad to coax out the first smile after the nightmare.

They ate a quiet breakfast together – Shepard refilled her cup with coffee at least once – and headed for the Citadel docking bay. A few hours later, they were in the air, retreating from the murky purple of the Serpent Nebula.

Shepard had insisted that they take the _Normandy_ for Garrus's meeting with the dignitaries on Palaven, not that he would have argued. The security detail accompanied him as always, but they took up residence on the crew level. Aboard a spectre ship, security was redundant. Their vigilance would resume once they landed on Palaven.

Of course, an escort of support ships, all equipped with top-of-the-line weapons and targeting systems, flanked the _Normandy_. If C-Sec hadn't insisted, Garrus would have. He was still a little spooked over Shepard's batarian encounter, and though she seemed unflappable as always, she had woken most nights this week with nightmares.

Garrus was grateful for the reprieve. Though it was a relatively short trip to Palaven, he enjoyed the freedom aboard the ship. He played cards with Shepard, Liara, and the new female recruit, Tara. After dinner, he and Shepard stole away to her cabin, with a wink from Liara and a catcall from Tara.

When Shepard's alarm roused them the next morning, they found excuses to stay tangled in each other for as long as they could, until Joker's voice came over the comm to let them know they were approaching Palaven.

Shepard gave him a quick kiss and disappeared into the bathroom for a shower, and Garrus dressed and headed downstairs. He made his way up to the cockpit to watch as they approached his homeworld.

Joker greeted him as soon as the doors slid closed behind him.

"Hey, Garrus, glad to have you back onboard. I got a joke for you. Why do the volus like the turians so much?"

Garrus chuckled: "Been waiting a while for this, huh?"

"Yeah, just a little. So ask why, already!"

"Okay," Garrus said. "Why _do _the volus like the turians so much?"

Joker replied quickly, a wicked grin flashing on his stubbled face: "Because if you stick a piece of coal up a turian's ass, you have a diamond within a week."

Garrus rolled his eyes, settling back to lean against one of the concave walls, his arms crossed over his chest.

"Very funny, Joker. I'm afraid I don't have any more human jokes for you, though. I didn't prepare like you evidently did."

"Yeah, obviously," Joker said, his voice mocking. "Which brings me to this one: what's the difference between a hanar poet and the best turian comedian?"

Garrus felt the groan rising up in him even before he heard the answer. Joker didn't disappoint, firing back before Garrus could even say a word.

"Only the first one can make you laugh."

He chuckled in spite of himself.

"Oh, I don't know. I had a few zingers for you before."

"True," Joker said. "But then, you're not exactly a typical turian. Shepard's humanized you or something."

"Oh has she?"

"Yeah, you're just as spiky as you used to be, and just as terrifying with a sniper rifle, but the stick up your ass is gone."

"Hmm," Garrus said. "Better not run out of ammo, then."

Joker guffawed and turned back to his controls as Palaven grew in their sights, filling the window before them. They were approaching from the dark side, and the planet glittered silver and mauve as they rounded the curve of the planet, the rays of the star Trebia glinting as they reflected off the atmosphere.

The reapers had finally left Palaven alone to focus on Earth, so the turians had been able to begin repairs before the humans had. Still, even from orbit, Garrus could see large swaths of blackened and burned-out land as they rounded the planet and began to approach. Once proud cities, now reduced to ashes. And he had been gone for so much of it.

"You know I was never a very good turian," he said suddenly.

Joker looked up from his controls: "Yeah, I know. Quitting C-Sec and all that."

He returned his concentration again to flying the ship. A turian voice came over the comm:

"This is traffic control, Cipritine Spaceport. Please identify."

"This is the SSV _Normandy _and escort, under council authority," Joker turned back towards Garrus to wink with that last line.

"Send landing codes for verification."

"Roger. Sending codes now."

There was a brief silence as the information was exchanged. Then that voice came over the comm again.

"SSV _Normandy_, you have permission to land at docking bay A1."

"Gotcha," Joker said. "Coming in."

Garrus watched as the planet drew ever closer, enveloping the entire window until he could no longer see the darkness of space around it.

"Hey, Garrus?" Joker said suddenly, still guiding the ship down to its landing bay. "Personally, I'm glad you're a bad turian. It's good having you around."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. And I know Shepard likes it too. She's more relaxed when you're on the _Normandy. _Doesn't hover as much. Oh, that reminds me. Why don't you see many turian women in council space?"

"Another joke?"

"You know it," he shot over his shoulder.

Garrus sighed, but asked the question he knew Joker was waiting for: "Why?"

"They're too busy running Palaven."

Joker cracked up at that one, leaving Garrus to shake his head. The voice behind them startled them both:

"Glad to know you find female leadership funny, Joker."

Garrus turned to see Shepard standing in the entryway, her arms crossed and a devilish grin on her face. Her tone had been mild enough, but Joker still spluttered at her unannounced presence.

"Commander," Joker said. "I, erm… Well, not _your_ leadership."

She laughed quietly, a light, pleasant sound that made Garrus smile automatically.

"Relax, Joker. I was kidding. Are we cleared to land?"

"Oh, yeah, I was about to radio you. We're landing at docking bay A1. Fancy, huh? All because we have a councilor onboard. We should travel like this more often."

Shepard was smiling when she answered, her eyes on Garrus.

"Yeah, we really should."

Joker rolled his eyes and swiveled around in his chair to face the control panel as the ship's auto-pilot engaged and glided them into a smooth stop at the bay.

**Tara**

She sensed Whitney didn't want to go with her to explore Palaven. That was fine – they had been friendly in the N7 program, but never close. She considered herself a bit of a lone wolf anyway. If you couldn't handle life on your own, then what good were you?

So she left him in the recreation room, sipping brandy with the shuttle pilot, who had been telling them about his friend Vega who had gone into the N7 program. Everyone on this crew had a war story. Hell, everyone in this galaxy had one now, but this crew's stories were especially Herculean.

When she pulled herself away from the stories, it was reluctantly, but she had never been to Palaven and didn't know when she would be back again. She wasn't one to leave an adventure to spoil on the shelf.

She ran into Shepard in the airlock, donning a thick radiation suit over her heavy armor. A few of the C-Sec security agents that had been following the council were there as well, presumably on their own shore leave. Tara slipped into her own radiation suit, and when she complained about feeling like a volus, Shepard chuckled.

"You're the tallest volus I've ever seen," the Captain replied. "Trust me, no one is going to confuse you."

"Yeah, they know a thing or two about the volus here. Client race, right?"

Shepard looked up, meeting her eyes through two layers of plexiglass mask. The corners of her eyes crinkled slightly and Tara already knew the friendly smile that would match. It was just obscured by radiation suit at the moment. Funny how fast you get to know someone when you spend a few days in close quarters.

They both headed the same way out the airlock, Joker sending a lazy half-salute-half-wave Shepard's way. Tara didn't miss the lingering look. It wasn't one of tenderness or attraction, but one of deep affection, loyalty, and a hint of wistfulness.

It made her wish a little that she had been there – during the Battle for Earth. Or perhaps it had been earlier that this bond was forged. She had noticed a lot of looks like that from the crew. Visual exchanges of deep history and nostalgia passed from glance to glance. The way the crew looked at Shepard like they were newly appreciative of what they had.

And of course, there were the looks between Councilor Vakarian and the Captain. She hadn't even begun to decipher the specifics of those looks, so laden were they with significance and story.

"Exploring?" Tara found herself asking. She liked to get to know people. Like puzzles, different personalities, cultures, and biologies had always fascinated her. The way the pieces always fit together – even when it wasn't readily apparent from the start.

And the Captain had a lot of puzzle pieces. But this puzzle just smiled with her eyes at her new recruit and responded with an invitation.

"Want to come?"

Hell yes, she did. What better way to see the Cipritine City for the first time than with the hero of the greatest battles of their time, her commanding officer, and presumably the wife or soon-to-be wife of the turian councilor?

She was slightly disappointed to learn that Shepard knew less than she did about the specifics of turian culture and history, though the woman had a way of communicating with the locals that defied Tara's best attempts. So they quickly fell into a pattern. Tara provided the history lesson, and equipped with the map on her datapad, they explored the city. Shepard provided the local relations.

Around midday, her stomach began to growl. She ran a search on her omni tool and found a levo restaurant recommended for local tourists and visiting dignitaries and suggested it to Shepard, who said she wasn't hungry, but would be glad to sit while Tara explored her lunch.

It didn't escape her notice, however, that the captain took out a protein bar and nibbled at it once they were inside the protective walls of the restaurant and they could remove their helmets.

She chose not to comment on it, and as her food arrived, she moved on to socializing of a more personal nature. She had always been bold.

"So you and the councilor?" She focused her eyes on her food, but kept Shepard in her periphery. The reaction was minimal.

"Garrus was one of the first members of my crew. We've been very close for many years."

"Turians aren't generally human's first pick, and I doubt you had any trouble getting _your_ first pick," Tara ventured.

If Shepard was shocked by her boldness, she didn't show it. Yes, this puzzle would take more time than most to put together.

"You're wondering what attracted me to him," her commanding officer simply stated, bluntly.

Tara said nothing, but met Shepard's eyes, the question in her own.

"Garrus has a tough shell," she said simply. "But once you get past his barriers, you'll understand. There's more to him than meets the eye."

Tara had a witty reply for that one, but even she wasn't up for that kind of banter with her boss. She pushed buttons, sure, but always carefully calculated. You had to push them without letting on what you were doing – that's how people revealed themselves to you.

She realized somewhere inside her how truly cynical that sounded. But if it ain't broke…

She simply nodded, then, taking a large bite of her lunch.

"I like that you march to the beat of your own drum."

The words were out before she could stop them – a moment of lack of self-control that she had to admit was rare. Her acting out was never about losing control – it was about keeping it.

But Shepard smiled her mysterious little smile and replied with a light comment:

"You looking for a turian boyfriend of your own? You've come to the right place. I'm glad to offer my insights."

Tara spluttered a little. This conversation had just taken a turn she wasn't expecting. But she recovered.

"It wouldn't be my first," she winked.

That one got a raised eyebrow from Shepard.

"Well, LT," she said. "I guess there's more to you than meets the eye as well."

**Garrus**

There was very little he hated more than being in a room full of barefaced politicians. Well, if he really thought about it, the list was longer than merits a quippy remark. Reapers. Collectors. C-Sec paperwork. Vorcha. Mercs. Omega's gangs. Omega in general. Batarians had officially moved a few ranks up that list in the events of the past week. And spiders. Definitely spiders.

But barefaced politicians were still high on the list, so he felt relief when Primarch Victus approached him prior to the meeting. A warm hand clapped on his shoulder and Victus steered him aside, out of the reach of even the stellar hearing of many of the generals in the room.

"Vakarian. Glad you could make it," Victus said, with real appreciation in his voice. "I could use a friendly face in this."

"What, the other primarchs not a fan of your leadership style?" Garrus asked, only slightly in jest.

Victus grimaced.

"You'd think they were all the primarch of Palaven and I was some upstart politician who needed to be trained in the ways of a leader. I may not be conventional, but convention isn't what defeated the Reapers."

Garrus nodded his assent. He knew how it felt to be the odd man out. He shared the turian obsession with justice and meritocracy, but rules and regulations chafed him like an itchy vest.

"So this dinner coming up. Are we just supposed to rub shoulders with the colony primarchs and make nice? That's not usually my style, but I can make it work for a night."

The primach chuckled: "More or less. Vakarian, you're an example of how unconventional can get things done. It's why I named you the councilor. You know your game, and you play it well. I need these barefaced pyjaks to open their eyes. We don't live in the same old galaxy."

Garrus just found himself nodding again. He hadn't asked for this, but Victus was a colleague and someone Garrus admired.

He reached out his hands, fingers spread. Victus laced his own fingers in. It was a gesture of agreement, of brotherhood. Two hands, fingers interlaced, were stronger together.

"Someone's got to teach this krogan spawn how to think with their heads, not their spurs," he replied.

They released their hands – the agreement made. If there were more politicians like Adrien Victus, perhaps he wouldn't feel like such a bad turian.

The sinking feeling in his stomach reminded him that shortly, he would be reminded very strongly of just what a failure to his species he was. Victus must have noticed the dark cloud that passed over his face, because he narrowed his eyes in concern.

"You all right, Vakarian?"

"Just fine, primarch," he said, recovering. "It's just going to be a long week."

"You can say that again."

**Shepard**

Garrus sped along the quiet back roads as Shepard gazed, enthralled, out the window at the alien landscape. Rolling hills carpeted with silvery-blue grasses that shivered in the wind gave way suddenly to jagged cliffs that opened onto the dark blue of the ocean.

"Did you like Cipritine City?" he asked.

"Yeah," Shepard replied. "The new LT and I did a lot of exploring. She's pretty knowledgeable about turian history. I was surprised."

"Please tell me it wasn't just the two of you," he said, a slight edge of concern to his voice.

"Don't worry, Garrus. Your agents followed us around like good little bodyguards," she chuckled. "They're good, too. I don't think Tara noticed them at all after we left the docking bay."

He smiled at that and gave a little sigh that she knew was unintended relief.

"Good," he said.

She let her smile linger on him a moment – his eyes focused on the road ahead, his hands draped almost languidly over the controls. Then, her attention was pulled back to the exotic countryside beyond the plexiglass window.

"How should I introduce you to my family?" Garrus asked suddenly.

"Just say whatever you're comfortable with," she said.

"No, that's not what I meant. I meant your, um… your name."

"My name?"

She looked at him, furrowing her brow in confusion.

"Well, should I use your full name? Ashley was Ashley Williams. Kaiden was Kaiden Alenko… I know you have a first name, I've just never heard anyone say it. I'm a little embarrassed, actually. Aren't we a little too close for me to be calling you by your last name?"

"Oh," she said. "No. Just 'Shepard' is fine."

She returned her focus to the passing scenery.

"You don't ever use your first name, do you?" he asked, cautiously.

"No," she said.

There was a silence, but she knew the question was brewing, so she answered it before he could ask, her gaze still fixed outside the window.

"No one has used my first name since… since my parents. Since before the raid on Mindoir. When I joined up with the Alliance, everyone just called me 'Shepard,' and it's been just 'Shepard' ever since."

Another silence. Garrus reached out and took her hand, folding her fingers into his large, flat palm.

"It's not even really my name anymore," she explained. "It sounds foreign – like it belongs to someone else."

"Well, then," Garrus said, and his voice was gentle, the flanging seemed amplified in this tone. "I guess I'll just have to find my own name for you."

She smiled a little at that and looked over at him. "Any ideas?"

"Hmm… Reaper-killer?"

She made a face, and he chuckled.

"How about 'the best damn human I've ever met'?" He suggested, a sly look on his face.

"Too wordy," Shepard said, feeling his banter lighten the atmosphere in the car.

"Sex goddess?"

She let out a spluttering laugh, but managed: "Not exactly appropriate for public use."

"Then I guess I'll have to get creative," he said, that sly expression intensifying as he looked at her out of the corner of his blue eyes.

"Should I be afraid?"

"Hmm… Very."

He smiled and continued driving in silence, but he left his hand around hers, warm and strong and encouraging.


	16. Clan Vakarian

Author's note: Here it is! Better late than never. More family drama and a decent dose of romance. And thank you all for the feedback and for indulging my writerly whims. Rest assured, I won't be changing anything in this story! If I rewrite my alternate ending, it will be a separate story. Enjoy :)

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><p><strong>Chapter 16: "Clan Vakarian"<strong>

**Garrus**

He felt his stomach begin to tense and twist inside him as they approached the outskirts of the city where he grew up. His hand must have tightened unconsciously around Shepard's, because she looked up at him and covered his hand with her other one.

"Are we almost there?" she asked, her voice gentle and sleepy from the long drive.

"Yeah," he said. "Just another few minutes."

She continued to caress the skin on his hand, her narrow, dexterous fingers tracing the slight ridges of his hands. It was soothing, but it did little to quell his nerves. Although he knew Solana had his father's ear, he couldn't imagine anything the old man would approve of less than his oldest child binding himself for eternity with a non-turian spectre. A vigilante, in his father's eyes. A dangerous figure.

He swallowed, hard.

He pulled the car around the bend, curving into the small docking station in front of his house. Glancing over at Shepard, he turned the car off.

"Ready?" he asked.

"You act like we're walking into a war zone," she said, and he heard the intentional lightness in her tone as she pulled on the radiation suit that she had stuffed down below her seat.

"We might be," he said grimly.

When she was fully shielded, he opened his door, and she followed, stepping out into the Palaven air. The sun was hanging low in the sky – there would only be a few more hours of daylight – but the radiation was still too dangerous to risk it.

He felt a strange bitterness in his stomach as he saw the state of his childhood home. There was barely a city on Palaven that had not experienced the terrible destruction of the Reapers, but somehow it surprised him to see the collapsed roof on the western corner of the home. The land around the house was torn up, and it roiled like an angry sea.

Shepard's hand on his shoulder startled him. He looked down and she met his eyes.

"Garrus," she said, a question in her voice.

He took her hand from his shoulder and squeezed it, sighing deeply.

"I'm fine," he said. "Let's go."

As they approached the door, it opened, revealing Solana. Her leg was still in a brace from the injury she had sustained during the Reaper attack, but she shrugged it off like a mild annoyance. She greeted them with a smile, giving Garrus a big hug. She whispered in his ear:

"I did my best."

His stomach clenched at that. It was ominous, at best, but he managed a weak smile nonetheless.

"Solana, this is Shepard."

Shepard bowed her head to Solana in a formal turian greeting, which Solana returned crisply, in her usual elegant manner.

"It's good to meet you, Shepard," she said. "My brother has nothing but good things to say about you."

Garrus's smile grew at that. It seemed his sister had thought over this and decided their father was opponent enough for him. The effort she was making was admirable. Solana ushered them inside, shutting the door firmly. Shepard shed her radiation suit, and Solana snatched it up to stow away in a decorative storage box in the main hall.

"Dad's in his study," she said to Garrus. "I've started on dinner, but you should go speak with him."

Garrus nodded. He wrapped an arm protectively around Shepard and guided her down the hallway.

"Well, Solana is lovely," Shepard whispered to him, tightening her own arm around his waist.

She said no more, knowing the sensitivity of turian hearing, but Garrus read the unspoken fear that his father would not be nearly so _lovely. _He was certain of that.

He knocked on the study door, which opened before him. His father was in his favorite armchair, datapad in his hand, as Garrus stepped through the door, tightening his one-armed embrace of Shepard's shoulders.

His father said nothing, simply staring down the couple as they approached him. Garrus cleared his throat, but Shepard spoke first, stepping away from Garrus and towards his father.

"I am honored to meet the esteemed father of my mate," she said, bowing to the elder Vakarian.

Garrus blinked, startled. Where had she learned that? He recovered quickly.

"Shepard, I am pleased to introduce you to my father, Vellus Vakarian."

Vellus seemed unperturbed by the display before him. He continued to observe them coldly, his face betraying nothing. Garrus felt his heart sink. This was the worst. This was exactly as his father had behaved when Garrus had been selected as a spectre candidate. The storm that followed this deceptive calm would shake the walls of this house.

Still without speaking a word, Vellus returned to his reading.

Solana, who had been hovering behind the couple, intervened quickly.

"Shepard," she said kindly, "could you please help me in the kitchen? I have never prepared levo food before."

"Of course," Shepard said.

She left, her head high and her posture proud and straight. The woman was more a turian than he was, and yet his father was rejecting her. He turned back to his dad, his expression stormy.

"Dad," he started.

"This is just a phase, Garrus. Do you understand me?"

Vellus spoke the words slowly, clearly, deliberately. Garrus heard no anger in the careful flanging of his father's voice, but he knew that the emotion was deep. It had not fully surfaced, and he braced himself for when it did.

"Dad, she will bring honor to me, not dishonor. She is a great warrior, a strong leader, and the most disciplined woman I have ever met."

"She is a human, and a spectre. You are the turian councilor, a general, and perhaps one day, you will be a primarch. Think about what she represents."

"She represents everything good in this galaxy."

Garrus tried to keep his voice as even and measured as his father's, but he felt himself failing, his tone wavering, his passion revealing itself. His anger rose up.

**Shepard**

Solana had provided an assortment of levo food she had found at a specialty grocery store and a few recipes she had looked up on the extranet. Shepard read them over carefully, following them to the letter. She was a miserable excuse for a cook, but she was not about to admit that to her future in-laws. Especially since they would never know any better, as they couldn't eat levo food at all. That was a small victory, at least. And right now, she would take her victories where she could get them.

And Solana was being quite pleasant, making conversation – mostly asking questions about Garrus. How was he handling the councilor position? Was he eating enough? Did he smile more now? He hadn't smiled much in the months he had spent on Palaven before the reaper attack.

Yes, Shepard had told her, he smiled a lot now. And when Solana's face broke into a grin of her own at that news, Shepard couldn't help but marvel at how their faces brightened in the same way. They had the same flat, smooth line of the cheekbones, the same flickering of the mandibles when amused. Solana's face was paler beneath the blue clan markings – and not scarred like Garrus's – and her fringe was shorter. But there was no mistaking their relation, in looks and in mannerisms.

Shepard had actually begun to enjoy herself, just a little, when the cacophony from the study jarred her out of her calm.

Her translator had difficulty picking up the words at this range, but she heard raised voices. Angry voices. One of them Garrus, and the other, she assumed, his father.

Solana shifted uncomfortably, her eyes – tinged with just the slightest amount of green – flicking towards the commotion before trying to distract Shepard with more questions, this time about human cuisine.

But Shepard would not be distracted. She answered the questions half-thinking, the rest of her attention focused on the sounds behind her. And then a piercing shout – louder than the rest – in Garrus's most passionate tones:

"_She makes me happy, dad!"_

"_Happiness is temporary! Honor is eternal!"_

"_Oh, spare me the platitudes."_

"_How can you remain happy if you are exiled from your community?"_

"_She _is_ my community!"_

A pause, then Garrus spoke again, his voice muffled by the wall between them, but clear nonetheless.

"_Dad, this is the woman I am going to marry. She is going to be a permanent part of my life. You can accept that, or you can choose not to. But that is not going to change the fact that she is my mate."_

Silence fell over the house. Solana resumed chopping some sort of palaven vegetables, her gaze downcast.

"He thinks I'm a bad influence." Shepard said, the statement almost a question.

Solana nodded.

"Our father is very traditional. He's always had big dreams for Garrus. He wanted him to accomplish great things…"

She trailed off.

"Solana, he _has_ accomplished great things."

"I know," the young turian woman said. "But dad can't always see past his prejudices. I'm sorry."

Shepard shook her head.

"It's not your fault," she said with a sigh. "Look. My parents have been dead for sixteen years. I have no idea what they would think of me marrying a turian, what with growing up during the First Contact War. But I would hope they would want me to be happy."

"_Is_ Garrus happy?" Solana asked, then, the vegetables forgotten.

Shepard looked her in the eyes, but it was Garrus who answered, from the doorway as he entered.

"Yes, Sol. I'm happier than I've ever been."

He crossed to Shepard, then, and pulled her close to him, speaking in hushed tones:

"Where the hell did you learn that little turian phrase back there?"

"I told you I did my research, Garrus," she whispered.

She cupped his face in her hands, tracing the scars on his face with a light touch. He looked at her the way he had looked at her before their suicide mission through the Omega 4 relay. The way he had looked at her when they were reunited on Menae. And she recognized just a little of the longing and the desperation of Archangel in the depths of his pale blue eyes.

He closed his eyes, sighing softly against her hand. When he reopened his eyes, the pain had evaporated from them.

Solana bowed her head, but Shepard knew she hadn't missed an instant of that exchange. If Sol was half as sharp as her brother, Shepard was sure she would never ask that question again.

By the time Vellus emerged from his study for dinner, the mood had lightened, and while most of the conversation was Sol catching Garrus up on the repairs in their home and the rebuilding of Palaven, Shepard couldn't help but notice the way that Vellus observed her interactions with Garrus when he thought she wasn't looking. She was still not expert on turian expressions, but she thought she saw a little bit of a father's love softening that scowl.

After dinner, Garrus guided her away from the living quarters, with Solana whispering a promise to take care of the clean up. They crossed the central courtyard of the house – night had set in, dropping the radiation to daytime Earth levels and cooling the stones of the patio.

At the far corner of the courtyard, Garrus typed into a console and the doors parted for them. Shepard stepped into a small, simple room. A low bed absent of blankets but buried in pillows was the centerpiece, and a small desk and chair finished off the furniture. She circled the room, taking in the holo-posters on the wall.

"Expel 10?" She asked, incredulously, stopping in front of the largest of the posters.

"Hey, I haven't lived here in a long time," he said in his defense.

"Yeah, well a little birdie told me that you still listen to them," she teased.

"A little birdie?" He cocked his head, the way he always did when she said something strange to him.

"It's just an expression."

She sat on his bed, beckoning him to her, pulling him down into the pillows. She curled her body into his, stroking the inside of his carapace lightly.

"How are you?" she asked quietly, pointedly.

"Fine," he said, a slight growl to his voice. He softened, pulling her closer, "He can't take you away from me."

"Damn right, he can't," she whispered forcefully.

"I did some research, too," he said. "On human customs. And… well… I didn't know what size ring you wear, or even what style you would want. So we can go get one, later. I want to do this right. But… I'm not familiar with human marriage rites, and…"

She cut him off with a kiss.

"Garrus," she admonished gently when she pulled away. "I don't want human rites. Or turian rites. I just want us. We don't have to do anything just because our culture says we should. Hell, we're already breaking about a million taboos on both sides, and that hasn't stopped either one of us yet."

He laughed at that, and she could practically see the nerves rushing out of him in that exhalation. She pushed him back with a gentle nudge of his shoulders, rolling him onto his back.

She settled herself on top of him, her fingers playing at the soft fabric of his shirt. Her dog tags slipped out from under the collar of her shirt, dangling in the space between them. Garrus reached up, fingering them lightly as she traced the lines of his face with her fingertips. After a moment, she looked down at the dog tags, his hand still twining in the chain, the silver tags against his palm.

"What're you thinking, Garrus?" she asked.

"What about these?" he replied, cryptically.

"What _about _them?" she smiled, leaning down to kiss a mandible lightly.

He kept his gaze on the tags, his expression thoughtful.

"Here," he said, gently hoisting her up and off of him.

She rolled onto her side, watching as he stood and crossed the room. He opened a small box on his desk and pulled something out, closing it tightly in his fist as he returned to her. He knelt beside her, spurs splayed out to the side as his toes turned in. Shepard lifted herself up to his eye-level, and he looked at her.

He held out his hand, palm outstretched, and she saw a copper chain with a small, octagonal medallion. She took it from him and examined it more closely.

"I haven't worn them since before I joined C-Sec. I kept them, though. It's not exactly something a turian would throw away."

She recognized the shape of the engraved lettering, though she couldn't read it. She looked up at him, and he met her gaze.

"Your dog tags?"

"Yeah," he said, and the way his mandibles spread said he was excited about something. "You said you wanted a ritual of our own, not specifically human or turian."

She nodded, and he continued:

"What if we had dog tags made – something that incorporated both designs – with both our names, written in your language and in mine?"

Shepard smiled, closing her hands around the cool metal of the tags. She flung her arms around his carapace.

"I love it, Garrus," she said.

He held her close for a moment, until she pulled away. She looked up at him, a smile on her face.

"Let's go outside," she said suddenly.

"What?"

"Outside. It's night – I can go out without that awful suit. I want to see Palaven without a plexiglass mask between me and the atmosphere."

"I think I like that idea," he said, following her out the door.

**Garrus**

The night was cool – the humid summer season was approaching, but none of the moisture hung in the air tonight. They walked around the property – his father's prominence had afforded them the means to live on a large estate on the outskirts of a city. Light pollution tinged the southwest sky along the horizon, but they walked east, into the darkness.

They stopped beside a small stream that fed into the ocean a few miles downstream. The house sat at a distance from them here, the light in Solana's room blinking into darkness and leaving them truly alone. Shepard turned to him, reaching her arms up to embrace him, linking her hands together behind his carapace. His arms encircled her waist – a fit they'd both found to be comfortable.

"So this is where you grew up," she said.

"Yeah," he said, his voice barely a whisper.

"Mostly good memories?" she asked.

"A little of both," he confessed. "My family was always very close, but my father was… demanding."

"And your mother?"

He smiled sadly at her memory, and Shepard placed a gentle kiss on his neck.

"My mother was the one who held us together," he said.

He looked down at her, meeting her eyes, which sparkled in the starlight.

"She would have loved you," he said. "Everything my father is blind to, she would have seen immediately. She would have seen that you make me happy. That would have been enough for her."

"I wish I could have met her."

"Yeah," he said. "Me too."

There was a long silence as she stared up at him, her eyes dark reflections of the night, searching him. He felt compelled to say what was on his mind.

"I'm not good at this, you know," he blurted out.

She cocked her head to the side, like she always did when he said something strange. He sighed. This is exactly what he meant.

"Turians… we don't talk about feelings very often," he explained. "Our language is about duty, honor, loyalty. That's the stuff of turian poetry."

"You guys write poetry?" she asked, her voice edged with humor.

"Not often," he grimaced. "For good reason. But I'm serious. I'm not sure there was even a word for… love… the romantic kind… until we made contact with other races."

"The asari," Shepard guessed.

Garrus nodded. "Most likely."

There was another long silence. A question hung in the air – he'd brought this topic up, and now he didn't know how to finish it. Typical. But her eyes were relentless, coaxing the answer out of him.

"I guess what I'm trying to say is…" he started, then pulled back the words, trying to find another way to say… he was truly horrible at this. Words were just… words.

"You know, right?" He finally asked. "You know that I… love you."

He expected some reaction from her then, but she just stood still there in his arms. Looking up at him calmly, her lips curved up in a slight smile. It was moments like this he found her inscrutable.

"Yes, Garrus," she said, her voice quiet in the night air. "I know."

"Good," he said, relief flooding his system and loosening his grip on her waist.

Sometimes he worried. She was human – she was used to a different kind of expression of love. Flowery words, silly presents, saccharine-sweet music. He had researched it all over the past year. But it had never seemed right. It had never seemed like _her._ But still he worried.

He frequently forgot: this woman spoke fluent turian.

Shepard had continued to watch him closely – no doubt catching every emotion flitting across his face.

"What?" he asked.

"Nothing," she said. "Just you. You've got your thinking face on."

He chuckled. "What does that mean?"

"You get all serious sometimes when you're lost in thought. Your mandibles go all flat against your face and your eyes look like you're off somewhere else."

"Well, I've been doing a lot of thinking lately," he said.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah, I need to come up with a suitable nickname for you. I've never had to do this before."

"Right," she teased. "Like you weren't the mastermind behind 'Archangel.'"

"Hey," he said. "The people on Omega started calling me that on their own."

"Sure," she said. He knew she was just riling him up, but he couldn't resist a verbal poke back at her.

"You don't believe me? And what if I start calling you 'monkey?' Think it will stick?"

She laughed in response: "Garrus, you wouldn't!"

"I've seen the vids. Funny little creatures – related to humans, if I remember correctly. They look like little hairy pyjaks, and they always seem like they're up to no good. Sound familiar?"

She swatted him with her hand.

"I am not a monkey, Garrus."

"Mmm hmm," he teased, letting sarcasm tinge his voice. "I'm not convinced."

He held her close to him and pulled her down into the grass. They landed, legs all askew, with Shepard straddling his waist.

The sky was clear that night, and the stars were crisp and defined against the black sky. It was incredible how the same night sky could look so strange and unfamiliar from the different corners of the galaxy. When he thought of the night sky, this was the image he always conjured: the constellations of his childhood.

Garrus relaxed into the feeling of her pressed against him, the sturdy Palaven grasses tickling the soft skin under his fringe.

"How much turian history did you learn in the Alliance Academy?" he asked suddenly.

She looked down at him, tilting her head as she answered: "The Unification War, the Krogan Rebellion, and the First Contact War, basically. Why?"

"You see those five stars, there?"

Her eyes followed his finger as he pointed out the constellation.

"Yeah," she said. "The bright ones almost on the horizon?"

"Yeah. That's the constellation Amea. Amea was a huntress, according to legend, the daughter of the moon, Menae, and the spirit of honor, Orus. She was very beautiful, and every young warrior wanted to marry her. She swore she would never marry anyone who could not defeat her on the battlefield, and many tried, but none succeeded."

Shepard was smiling, the starlight softening the curves of her face. He loved the way she looked at him so earnestly, when she was really listening, hanging on every word.

"So she remained unmarried, a great war hero, for many years, until she met the spirit of justice, Varix, on the battlefield. They were perfectly matched, and their battle stretched for weeks. When they could both fight no more, they lay down their swords and were married."

Garrus reached up, his fingers brushing lightly against the velvet of Shepard's skin. He pulled her down to nuzzle her cheek, and when he looked back up into her eyes, he continued his story, cupping her face in his hand.

"They always fought together from then on, and she became known as the spirit of valor. When they died, their children cast them up into the stars for eternity, the spirit of justice and the spirit of valor."

Shepard smiled, kissing the palm of his hand softly.

"I like that story," she said softly. "It reminds me of some of the legends we had on Earth. Gods and goddesses fighting mythical creatures and protecting mankind. Most of our stories end much more tragically, though."

"Oh trust me, that's one of the happier turian legends," Garrus chuckled. "Amea, the spirit of valor, is the patron spirit of the turian military. Her image is carved above the entrance of every barracks that I know of."

They both gazed at the bright stars then: Amea and her lover, her partner, her comrade-in-arms. Garrus pushed himself up, propping himself up with his hands on the ground behind him, to rest his head on Shepard's shoulder. She wrapped her arms around his cowl, her fingers stroking his fringe.

"Amea," he said softly.

"What?" she whispered into his forehead, her lips brushing his plating.

"Amea. That's it," he tilted his head back to look her in the eye. "If you like it, I mean."

"Well, it's definitely better than 'monkey,'" she said, pulling him close.

She kissed him fiercely, pulling his torso against hers, pressing her small hands into the plating of his back. A gentle hum of contentment rose from his chest as he kissed her back.

"So," he said, when they finally separated.

"So," she mimicked, tracing her fingers inside his carapace.

"Will you be my date tomorrow night? To the dignitaries' dinner at Cipritine?"

"I packed a dress and everything."

"I've never seen you in a dress," he said.

"There's a first time for everything," she quipped. "And make sure you get a good look tomorrow, because it won't happen often."

"Oh, I will," he growled, flicking his tongue against that sensitive spot beneath her ear. She shivered.

"I'm a lucky man to have you on my arm," he said, half joking. "I may need you to save me. Sweet talk all those crabby politicians with that silver tongue of yours."

"Whatever you say, boss."

"Boss, hmm?"

She grinned and leaned down, her lips teasing his scarred mandible as she whispered: "Technically, you're _my_ boss now, Mr. Councilor. The tables have turned."

He heard his voice drop as he replied: "I like the sound of that."

"Yeah?" she teased. "Now you're the one carrying on with a subordinate. How's that feel?"

He let his hands wander down her hips, cupping her ass and pulling her close.

"Scandalous. Sexy. Perfect," he punctuated each word with a stroke of his hands against her lower back. "But I'm not 'carrying on,'" he whispered against her temple, rustling the hairs that swept back from her forehead. "I'm making love."

"Not yet, you're not. But I can fix that."

She flicked her tongue against his neck, pulling a groan out of him. He flipped her over, pressing her body between his and the grass.

So he made love to her. He had learned what those words meant on their night together before the Omega 4 relay. This was their love language: sighs and groans and cries of ecstasy in the night. He loved the sounds he pulled from her, and he reciprocated with his own.

He felt her body close around him, her legs wrapping up and around his waist, as her head tilted back into the grass. Her thighs against his sensitive waist sparked the fire in his core. Her seeking hands found the sections of pliable skin at the back of his neck and along his sides.

For his part, he delighted in the cascade of hair that tousled over her face as she writhed. He was besotted with the twists and turns of her muscular body and with the smoothness of the skin that stretched taut over her stomach as she arched her back. He relished everything about that tiny sphere of flesh crowned with hair where her thighs met: the shaky gasps it elicited from her, the tangy smell and taste of it, and the way she seemed to come apart in his hands in those moments when he turned his hawk-like focus entirely on her and her pleasure.

Sometimes, she clung to him, desperate for his touch, and sometimes she seemed to lose all structure to her body – her limbs cascading across the ground as if she no longer had the will or the presence to hold them together. Like water running through his fingers, she melted into him.

Tonight, she held him close, the coolness of her body beneath him and the night air around him like a refreshing breeze. She held her lips near his ear so every moan and whisper was absorbed into his skin as he sunk into her, merging their bodies.

He knew what it was to lose her. It was as intensely, powerfully awful as loving her was beautiful. Here, when they were connected like this, he finally felt confident that he would never lose her again. He finally realized that she was here. To stay.


	17. Turian Hospitality

**Chapter 17: "Turian Hospitality"  
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**Shepard**

They both woke as the first light of morning was lifting the darkness of the cool room. Shepard pulled on pants and a simple shirt, stretching out her back against the knots in her muscles.

"Sleep alright?" Garrus asked.

"Yeah, I slept fine, but I'm regretting it now."

She massaged her lower back with her palms. Those strange, lumpy pillows had done a number on her. It felt like she'd slept on every part of her body the wrong way. Garrus grimaced.

"Sorry. Turians don't generally worry about comfort."

"I wouldn't worry about comfort, either, if I were covered in armor buck naked," she replied cheekily.

He chuckled, but his voice was concerned when he asked: "Any dreams?"

"No nightmares," she reassured him. "Just merciful sleep."

He smiled as she kissed him on his scarred mandible.

"So do turians do breakfast?" She asked.

"We do."

"Then let's do it. I'm hungry."

He chuckled again and led her out of his room and to the kitchen.

Solana was already up, and presumably, so was Vellus. She emerged from his study with an empty cup and nodded to Garrus and Shepard as they passed.

"I'm just getting dad a second cup of tea, but there's food out in the kitchen. The stuff on the right is safe for Shepard – I hope you like… it."

Shepard smiled as warmly as she could. "I'm sure I will. You didn't have to do this."

"Nonsense," Sol said. "Have you never heard of turian hospitality?"

She led the way into the kitchen and filled the cup with a steaming brown liquid – a spiced turian tea customarily drunk with breakfast. She ducked out to deliver the beverage as Shepard explored a pile of pastries on a plate on the right side of the counter.

"Did you tell your sister I eat like a horse or did she just guess?" Shepard remarked at the spread she encountered. She couldn't help the little laugh that escaped her at the size of the pile of pastries.

"Neither. That's just Sol being… well, really friendly," Garrus said, his voice turning thoughtful at the end.

"Problem?"

"Not at all," he said, picking out a pastry of his own from the left and scooping a purple mush that Shepard assumed was a sort of dextro scrambled eggs from a ceramic cooking pot on the stove.

Shepard selected a berry muffin and a croissant from the pile. Most of the pastries were dry and hard, more like biscuits than fluffy breakfast baked goods, but she couldn't expect finding a good levo bakery was easy in a Palaven city. She was already a little uncomfortable with the lengths Solana had gone to. She would have been just fine with the protein bars she packed.

"You're lost again," Garrus remarked.

"Huh?"

"In your head. You've gone to ground. What's going on in there?"

She shook her head and joined him at the table, adjusting her chair as much as she could to accommodate her considerably less lanky human frame.

"Nothing. Just… she really didn't have to go to this much trouble."

"Try telling her that," Garrus said in an exasperated tone. "She's always been the overachiever in the family."

"Not like you made it difficult for me, slacker," Sol retorted sarcastically as she re-emerged through the doorway. "Military standout. C-Sec agent. Promoted to general before turning thirty. Expert Reaper adviser to the primarchs. Oh yeah, and representative of the turian people on the galactic council."

Garrus rolled his eyes.

"Too bad your father doesn't see all that," Shepard said, reaching out to caress his hand over the table.

"Yeah, listen to Sol tell it and I'm the perfect son. What happened to the part where I fled the rules and regulations of C-Sec for the wilds of Omega to kill as I pleased and descend into chaos? Dad loves that part of the story."

"I'm just glad you're back, Gar. I don't care what you did for two years," Sol's eyes lingered on the scars on his face for a moment before locking with her brother's.

"Thanks, Sol. That means a lot."

Sol smiled at her brother, and then a little shyly at Shepard before returning to her own breakfast. They ate for a moment in silence, Shepard casting the occasional skeptical glance at Garrus's plate. Those eggs did not look edible, and she supposed they weren't for her, but it was unsettling. She took a bite of the muffin. It was a little dry, but certainly better than mess hall food.

"This is delicious," she told Solana. "Thank you."

"It wasn't a problem. They have a levo grocer in the city. I didn't know what to get, so I got one of everything."

Shep bit back a joke, not wanting to offend her hostess, but it was clear that Sol had literally purchased one of everything in the store. The excess was sweet, but comical.

Garrus's omni-tool beeped, and he checked it.

"Primarch Victus wants to talk. I need to take this – I'll just be a few minutes," he said, glancing from Shepard to his sister.

The ladies nodded as he left the room to call the primarch. Another moment of silence as they chewed their food, both staring at the table. Shepard wanted to say something, but she didn't know what to say. With Garrus around, she could read his body language for cues. She'd gotten pretty good at interpreting turian sounds and gestures, but Garrus had his own quirks and sometimes the other turians were more foreign to her than he was.

And this was important. She didn't want to lose Sol's support. She was the only part of Garrus's family that accepted their relationship, even though Shepard had a sneaking suspicion that it was more out of loyalty to Garrus than anything else.

"Look, I wanted to apologize," Sol suddenly blurted out.

"It's okay," Shepard started, but Solana cut her off.

"Not for my father. For me." She took a deep breath before she continued, and her head tilted and her eyes searched the room around them, exactly as Garrus's did when he was flustered or didn't know how to find the right words.

_Maybe I am getting this_, Shepard thought.

Solana continued: "I have to admit that I was skeptical when Garrus told me about you. I didn't exactly learn the nicest things about humans growing up, and we were all so worried about him, especially when he left C-Sec. We – _I – _thought it was your influence, and I was angry."

Shepard shifted uncomfortably.

"But I have to accept that Garrus is who he is. He's always been an… _individual_. But he's still my brother. And I see the way he looks at you. I see the way he acts around you. He's serious about this."

Shepard nodded, meeting Solana's eyes carefully, deliberately.

"Yes, Sol. He is. And so am I."

Solana returned the nod.

"I can't promise my father will ever forgive Garrus for this. But I want you to know that I see nothing to forgive. If you are the woman Garrus wants for his mate, then I accept you as my sister."

Shepard couldn't respond at first. She found herself surprised at the way the words caught in her throat like cotton fibers, scratching and tickling until she had to cough. But she swallowed and managed:

"Thanks, Solana. I'm glad to have you as my sister."

She heard the door to Vellus's study open in the hall behind her, but it was not until she heard her name that she truly registered it.

"Captain Shepard," Vellus said. "I would like a word."

She couldn't tell if the shocked look on Solana's face was a good sign or a bad one, but she stepped wordlessly into the study. Vellus shut the door and gestured to a chair, taking a seat himself behind his desk.

He watched her for a moment, his eyes the same steely blue as Garrus's, but his face longer, thinner, sharper. Garrus must take after his mother, she realized, and suddenly she understood a little piece of Vellus's anger.

"Garrus is my only son," he said finally, his voice quiet. "He showed great talent from a young age, but also great recklessness. He was headstrong. Impulsive."

He trailed off into silence. She nodded her understanding. _You worried about him_, she thought.

"I fought in the Relay 314 Incident," he said, abruptly resuming his speech. She followed his train of thought to its new destination, though the connection was not too difficult to make, "and I saw how impetuous you humans were. How hot-headed. Quick to start a war with the first race you encountered beyond your homeworld. Opening every gate to the unknown. Slow to understand the implications of your actions."

Shepard bit her tongue. She had a few choice words for him, but she wanted to know where he was going with this, and her curiosity got the better of her temper.

"Garrus was born only a few years after that war. I would be lying if I said that the way I raised him was not shaped by my experiences. I was concerned when I saw how quick he was to disobey, to challenge authority. It is not our way."

He stood then, drawing himself up to his full height and looking her in the eyes.

"But he is my only son," he said again. "And no matter what I try, he will not change his ways."

She met his gaze, trying to read behind the unsettling calm in his expression. She couldn't.

"Sir," she said, taking advantage of his silence to speak up. "Garrus is the turian councilor, the youngest in history. He is a hero of the war against the Reapers. Everything I did, I could not have done without him. And I can assure you, he has always wanted to do what was right. And he has always wanted to make you proud."

She wasn't expecting the sigh that came from the elder Vakarian, then, and she was disarmed by how like Garrus he suddenly seemed.

"I know," he said.

He bent over his desk, planting his palms on the surface and bringing himself down to her eye level.

"I won't lose him, Shepard," he said.

_Now, why did that sound like a surrender?_ She wondered.

He sighed again.

"I can no longer tell him what to do," he said. "Perhaps I was kidding myself if I ever thought I could. But he follows _you_, now. That much is clear."

He sat down, suddenly, his shoulders hunched.

"Garrus follows his _own_ judgment," she said firmly. "He always has. It's what I have always respected about him. It's why I valued his input from the start. He has made you proud, sir, even if you can't see it."

With that, she stood. Vellus gave her a nod – barely perceptible, but significant.

"Take care of him, Shepard," he said. "And make sure he doesn't forget us."

She saw him suddenly for what he was – a frightened, cornered old man who saw his world closing in around him.

"I will," she said, her voice softening. "But if you want to keep Garrus close, you need to meet him halfway."

She turned and left then. Vellus remained at his desk, hunched and silent.

**Garrus**

Garrus had been wondering about that little, sly smirk on Shepard's face since he had emerged from his call with Victus. She had been waltzing down the inner hall to his room when she caught his eye.

"What?" he'd asked immediately.

She had just smiled and replied: "Later," in a way that made him instantly impatient.

They had said goodbye to his family and headed back to Cipritine City, Shepard still mysteriously quiet. He had noticed that his father had made the effort to walk all the way to the door to bid them farewell – perhaps the storm cloud over his head was lifting.

Shepard finally revealed her secret when they were halfway to Cipritine City. She told him how his father had called him into his study.

"So did he give us his blessing?" he asked, incredulous.

"Not explicitly," she mused. "But I think he was telling me that he wouldn't fight it. But he doesn't have to like it."

Garrus scoffed: "That's just like him. Digging in his heels."

She rested her hand gently on his.

"It's something, Garrus."

He sighed and let his clenched jaw relax, his mandibles fluttering away as he exhaled.

"Yeah, it's something."

They arrived back at the spaceport late in the afternoon, and Shepard removed the radiation suit with an audible sigh of relief.

"That thing is worse than armor," she said, turning to kiss him lightly. "I'm going to go freshen up and start to get together for this dinner. You go ahead and play with the guns."

He chuckled, "Some things never change?"

She gave him a warm smile: "Let's hope not."

He lost himself in the calibrations in the main battery for longer than he had expected. Running the numbers was soothing – it allowed him to focus on something concrete, something that he had control over. He itched for a gun range and a good Viper sniper rifle to lock his focus onto, but the _Normandy_ wasn't quite large enough for that sort of luxury, so he made himself content with calibrations.

When he finally checked the time on the console, he realized he needed to rush upstairs to get changed for the dinner. As the doors to Shepard's cabin whirred open, he was surprised to see Liara standing near the desk and no sign of Shepard.

She caught his surprised look and gestured to the ajar bathroom door.

"She's in there," Liara said. "I got some new information from one of my contacts, and she wanted to hear it while she got ready for your big date tonight."

"So what did your contact say about the merc connection?"

Shepard's voice came through the door, rounded and echoing off the tiled walls. Garrus scrounged through a drawer, looking for his dress uniform.

"Well, your old friend Balak is the de-facto head of the Hegemony military now," Liara said, and Garrus heard Shepard scoff at the words _old friend, _"but the terrorist group he used to head up is still active. I have a contact inside – he's relatively new – and he says they're closing ranks. Fast. I'll have him keep his ears to the ground, but I would consider them the most likely suspect at this point. I still have my contacts on the Citadel on the lookout, in case we can find a connection to whoever… well, whoever tracked you."

"What about that list I forwarded you from the restaurant. Any hits on that?"

Garrus turned, fully intending to stake his claim on the bathroom so he could change without interrupting this important conversation, and saw that Shepard was already emerging from the bathroom. And he couldn't help but interrupt when he saw her.

Already, after only a year, he was starting to see what human men saw when their women got dressed up in those certain outfits that were meant to thrill. He never saw Shepard in anything but practical gear – or nothing at all – but the way this dress skimmed along the curve of her hip, the way the sheen of it drew the light to her waist and the elegant length of her collarbone…

He wasn't quite sure what sound escaped him, but suddenly both women had eyes on him. Liara hid a smile behind her hand, but she wasn't fooling anybody. Garrus knew the expression that must be on his face, but he couldn't seem to help himself.

Shepard cast a glance at him, looking out from beneath her eyelashes the way she always did when she was intentionally seducing him. His stomach jumped and his mouth was suddenly very dry.

The heavy-lidded look broke when Shepard suddenly grinned at him, her eyes crinkling at the side the way they did when she _really_ smiled.

"Jaw off the floor, Vakarian," she teased him.

He snapped his mouth shut with a click.

"I, uh… Hmmm. You, uh…. You… Hmm."

It was all he could manage as she strode up to him, high heels giving her walk a new sway he had never seen before. She tipped his chin up with a finger beneath the plating.

"You're quite the Casanova, Garrus, but next time you don't have to be so eloquent."

Her eyes sparkled up at him, and he chuckled low in his throat.

"I have no idea what a Casanova is, but can I help it? You caught me off-guard. And you look beautiful."

Liara coughed pointedly, drawing their attention back to her.

"Should I leave you two alone?" she asked.

"Unfortunately, we don't have time for that," Garrus chuckled. "As soon as I get changed, we should be going."

"Well, in regards to your question, Shepard, no hits yet on that list, but I'll forward them along as soon as anything comes up."

"Thanks, Liara," Shepard said. "Now, while Garrus scrambles to get decent, will you help me figure out what to do with my hair?"

Liara sighed happily and Garrus heard her reply as he shut the door behind him, still slightly breathless.

"It's not often I get to just be a girl," Liara said.

"I'm not sure I even remember how," Shepard replied.


	18. You Messed with the Wrong Spectre

Author's Note: So it looks like my updates will be taking a little longer than expected... I will get them out as fast as I can, so be looking for them every 2-4 weeks, and I promise this isn't a sign that I'm losing interest in this. I just have a lot more going on now (school, ME Big Bang composition, and my own original sci-fi novel, plus two jobs). I WILL be finishing this - probably at about 40 chapters. As always, a big thanks to all my loyal readers - I love you all! - and to my amazing beta. And thanks to Bioware for creating a world so amazing I couldn't bear to leave it after the games were over.)

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><p><strong>Chapter 18: "You Messed With the Wrong Spectre"<strong>

**Tali**

Tali knew that patience wasn't one of her virtues, but even she was surprised at how quickly Xen and Gerrel had gotten onto her very last nerve. She itched right now, sitting quietly in the mess hall of the _Barunaal_, the first starship built on the homeworld. It was the Admiralty's official transport ship, now that they weren't required to each live on their own ship.

She preferred it the old way. Listening to Xen's supercilious tone and Gerrel's obnoxious finger-tapping was almost enough to make her long for the days when she was a pariah to her people. Almost. It at least made her long for the part where she was aboard the _Normandy_ with Shepard and her team.

They were headed to the Citadel, where talks would begin next week with the Council and the Geth, to determine their role in the new galaxy. Things had changed, that was for sure. It made her head spin – it was almost as if she had fallen asleep somewhere along the way, and this was all just a bizarre dream. Geth allies. Homeworld. Meeting with the council in hopes of gaining a council seat.

She wasn't naïve enough to believe they would be given a council seat outright, especially when they hadn't even had an embassy on the Citadel, but Tali was hopeful that the talks would go well, despite the two admirals sitting near her. With Raan's intelligence, Koris's even-keeled temper, and her own experience fighting the reapers, she hoped they would balance out Xen and Gerrel's arrogance and win the Council's respect.

It would be a long trip to the Citadel, but she hoped it would be worth it. At the very least, she would finally get a chance to see Shepard, Garrus, and Liara again. She had a whole arsenal of jabs at Garrus's diplomatic skills that she was just itching to use. After all, he had given her a hard time when she was named an admiral. It was only fair to pay him back in full…

**Shepard**

The dinner had been every bit as dull as she had expected, full of formal speeches and terrible food. She would have assumed that her dry and tasteless meal was due to the turian lack of familiarity with levo food, but from the way Garrus was pushing his own meal around, she didn't think it was exclusive to her plate.

She tried to listen to the speeches, and she did catch the jist of them, but she found herself distracted by the irritating rub of her shoes against her heel and the constant awareness that she had a purse she was supposed to keep track of. She missed having a kit strapped to her waist – that way, it was practically part of her and she didn't have to think about it. Her kind of accessories came with holsters and snapped easily onto her armor.

Not to mention it had been difficult to conceal a weapon under this dress, and the pistol she had managed to strap to her inner thigh made it impossible for her to cross her legs.

So she sat there, knees knocking uncomfortably together as she tried to sit like a lady without crossing her legs, pushing dry and dull food around her plate as her stomach growled, and finding that most turians were much less interesting and witty than Garrus. The evening was nearly over, and she couldn't be thankful enough.

She shifted again in her seat, and Garrus cast a glance at her.

"You okay?" he murmured.

"Yeah," she replied under her breath. "Bored to death and wishing ladies wore combat boots to events like this, but yeah… okay."

She knew Garrus's silent chuckle by the way his shoulders undulated.

"Can't bring you anywhere, huh?" he teased.

"Anywhere but here," she said.

"Tell you what, I'll take you out to shoot bottles again when we're back on the Citadel. To make up for boring you so much."

"Good," she said. "I owe you an ass-kicking, anyway."

"I didn't say it would be a rematch."

"Scared?"

He gave that silent laugh again and she felt her mood brighten at the smile creeping across his face. He squeezed her hand under the table and they both returned their attention to the primarch currently speaking.

After a moment, Garrus leaned almost imperceptibly towards her and spoke in a low murmur:

"See that primarch over there? The one in the red suit, whose fringe looks a little bent?"

She picked out the one he meant. He looked about Garrus's age, with paler grey plating and no clan markings – _barefaced_, Garrus had called that. She nodded subtly to show him she was following.

"He's the primarch of Epyrus Colony. His name is Nehlon Tornnus**.** We were in boot camp together."

"Yeah? He half the soldier you are?"

"Pissed himself the first time he shot a rocket launcher in training. We never let him hear the end of it."

Now, it was her turn to chuckle. She did her best to hide it, but she did catch Victus, at the head of the table and just to Garrus's left, giving them a warning look.

"He was a useless excuse for a soldier," Garrus continued under his breath. "No wonder he became a barefaced politician."

Victus cleared his throat and shook his head gently at Garrus when they made eye contact. But Shepard could tell by the way his mandibles were quivering that the Primarch of Palaven was trying hard not to crack a grin himself. She bit her lip to melt her own smile away.

"Killjoy," Garrus muttered good-naturedly, but he fell in line and shut his mouth.

The speaker took his seat, and Victus stood to close the evening.

"I know it has been a long evening, so I will be brief," the Primarch of Palaven said – Shepard was almost sure he winked at Garrus, but it was so subtle as to be nearly imperceptible.

He continued: "Our annual State Dinner is a time-honored tradition, and I want to thank each of you for attending, from colonies and nations near and far. As order is restored to the galaxy, I see this dinner as a symbol of our recovery. There are still struggles ahead – cities still burning and trillions of lives to mourn. But we can still come together, a united galaxy, and that tells me we will survive, and we will return even stronger than we were before. Thank you for being a part of this symbol. Spirits be with you."

Processional music began, and Victus gestured to Garrus and Shepard, and the other visiting ambassadors from the asari, salarian, and volus worlds, and they led the procession out of the room. Shepard was grateful to feel blood rushing back to her legs as the walk towards the grand doors stretched them. She heard a similarly contented sigh from Garrus and smiled.

Suddenly, the wide doors in front of them flew open. She registered the armor, the weapons, and the purposeful movement of the twenty-odd turians who entered the room as instantaneously as she registered the sinking feeling of _wrongness_ in her gut.

**Garrus**

Garrus stiffened as the armored men surrounded them. They moved swiftly – as swiftly as the secret service who seemed to appear out of the woodwork, taking down a few of the commandos.

Shepard moved quickly – he saw her lunge for one of them, trying to disarm him. Before he could even wonder what they wanted, they had surround Shepard. One of them grabbed her, pulling her away from the group towards the door and holding a pistol to her head. He started to back away slowly, his men circling around them.

Garrus started to move towards Shepard, but his security detail closed around him. Shepard struggled against the hand wrapped around her chest and shoulders, pinning her to her abductor. He tried to get to her, blocked by the tight circle of bodyguards. He drew himself up to his full height and brought his face within millimeters of the guard directly in front of him.

"Don't get in my way," he hissed. "_Help_ me."

The bodyguard's firm stare wavered. His eyes glanced at the men to his side, and his stance loosened. Out of the corner of his eye, Garrus saw the faint orange glow of Shepard's omni-tool activating. As her abductor pulled her slowly backwards and out of the room, he noticed her shifting slightly, bit by bit, until…

She pivoted her hips in one sudden twist, rotating her torso and bringing her arm with it, the knife on her omni tool sinking into the gut of the turian who held her captive. She knew right where to put it, too, and Garrus winced in spite of himself as she plunged the knife deeper into the slit where the armor plates met, deeper into the vulnerable skin of the turian's abdomen.

Her assailant loosened his grip on her and she whirled away beneath his arms, tugging her skirt up a few inches and pulling out a small pistol she had strapped to her leg. She pointed her gun at him, but he was already sliding to the ground, alive but incapacitated.

The others closed in as Shepard ducked behind a table.

"Everybody down!" he heard her shout, and the dignitaries began to duck behind tables, chairs, displays – anything they could find.

Garrus shoved aside his bodyguard and leapt across the room, catapulting himself over the table and into cover beside Shepard.

"You okay?" he asked quickly.

"Yeah. He's got some weapons," she said, gesturing to the turian who was writhing on the ground, trying to ease the escape of thick, blue blood from his abdomen.

"Hurts, doesn't it?" Garrus growled as he searched the unknown turian, removing an assault rifle and a pistol. Not his favorite, but they would have to do. He could make the assault rifle work.

The turian groaned and closed his eyes. Garrus noted his facial markings – a small back-water colony. But none of the turians shared the same markings, so he doubted there was a colony connection. No, this was something bigger.

He crouched beside Shepard, checking the assault rifle's ammo. Incendiary rounds, still fully loaded. Not bad. Shepard kicked off the high-heeled shoes she had been wearing, slinging them off to the side and out of her way.

"Much better," she muttered, then turned her focus on him.

He met Shepard's eyes and they both nodded, immediately springing out from cover to land well-placed shots on the approaching assailants. Garrus noted with satisfaction that his team of bodyguards were firing, too, pulling the assailants away from them.

"Garrus, my six," she shouted, and he sprung behind her, assault rifle spray dropping one of their attackers.

Shepard dove behind the next table and Garrus followed. Their backs pressed together, they both reloaded.

And then he saw it. Strapped to the back of the one he had just felled with his assault rifle. A Kishick Harpoon sniper rifle. He reached for it.

"We've got a runner," Shep said. "Cover me!"

She shot up, tearing after the final, fleeing turian down the main entrance hallway as Garrus grabbed the sniper rifle and propped it on the table, setting up the shot with swift, fluid motions. Yeah, this felt right.

He lined the runner up in his scope. Shepard sprinted in pursuit, but she wasn't closing the distance fast enough. The door was nearby, and he knew the winding corridors would make it easy for him to lose Shepard.

Garrus took a deep breath, waiting for his grip to settle, for the scope to still and the barrel to point effortlessly at its target. Everything came into sharp focus. His heart beat in his chest, the rhythm heightening his senses and easing his nerves. He felt his arms align with the gun: perfect synergy.

He took the shot. The turian dropped, his shoulder shredded. Still watching through the scope, he saw the turian scramble for his fallen gun, but not fast enough. Shepard was on him, kicking the gun away and then pinning the turian to the ground, the blade of her foot on his neck and her gun pointed soundly at his head.

"You're under arrest," she said calmly.

She looked back over her shoulder, grinning at Garrus.

"Nice shot," she shouted. "Not to diminish your contribution, but could you bring me my purse?"

He chuckled and rose, shifting the rifle to his side and fetching Shepard's purse from her chair. He brought it to her and she pulled out a set of handcuffs and tossed them to Garrus.

"Cuff the other guy?" she asked, pulling out another set and slapping them on the criminal on the floor.

"I think I remember how," he said dryly, crossing to the still-bleeding mess on the floor. "You messed with the wrong spectre," he chuckled as he cuffed Shepard's victim. It was almost superfluous, as the would-be-abductor was immobilized with pain and blood loss.

"I need some medi-gel over here," he said to one of the members of his security detail.

"There's a medical team on the way," the C-Sec agent responded, but he pulled a medi-gel pack out of his own kit and handed it to Garrus.

Shepard had shoved her personal prisoner into the arms of another of Garrus's security detail and was now bounding from table to table to check on the frightened politicians. The good news was that turian primarchs were nearly always generals in the military first, so they all were relatively unscathed. It was the handful of visiting asari, salarians, humans, and volus who were shaken.

"I need a med kit!" he heard Shepard shout.

He grabbed the kit from the agent next to him and bounded over to her, kneeling by her side as she examined a gaping wound in an asari diplomat. She took the medigel from him and gently applied it to the asari's mottled blue skin.

"Don't worry, this will be healed in no time. It's nothing," Shepard smiled as she reassured the woman, who managed a nod.

While Shepard tended to the wounded asari and a trembling volus who seemed more scared than injured, Garrus circled around the room, righting tables and chairs and helping the remaining dignitaries up. He inspected the bodies of the two dead assailants. Two turians, both with different facial markings. They carried turian pistols and assault rifles, but he noticed an unusual shotgun.

He picked it up, meeting Shepard as she crossed to the center of the room. He held out the shotgun and the sniper rifle he'd picked up.

"Notice anything?" he asked.

"They're batarian," she said grimly. "Man, they hold a grudge. We need to keep everything," she said suddenly to the agent whose medical kit Garrus had requisitioned. "Send it back to spectre headquarters on the Citadel."

The agent nodded and began to gather up the evidence. Shepard turned back to Garrus and murmured just loud enough for him to hear: "I'll make sure our all-seeing friend gets a copy of the report."

Garrus nodded: "Good idea."

She sighed as he handed off the batarian weapons to the agents and he glanced over at her. She leaned wearily against a table.

"Well, my first public appearance with you and it ended in a gun fight where I killed two turians and arrested two more. Can't imagine that won me any points with your father."

He tucked a stray hair behind her ear, drawing her attention to him until their eyes met.

"No," he said firmly, "but it won you some points with me, not that you needed any more."

Her face eased into a smile at that, and he allowed himself a self-satisfied smirk of his own and whispered in her ear:

"Besides, one of those kills was mine. I can't let you take all the credit."

"Keep dreamin', Vakarian," she said, placing a hand on the side of his face affectionately before they pulled apart.


	19. Bring It On

Author's note: First, I am SO SORRY I was gone for so long. Mass Effect Big Bang took much more of my time and energy than I'd predicted. My posting date is October 24, and I'll put a link in my profile for anyone who's interested. It may eventually make its way to , but I can't post with my artist's beautiful illustrations here, and you guys would be seriously missing out. Second, I'm sorry in advance, because I'll be gone for all of November due to NaNoWriMo. I'll be posting as I go on fictionpress, and if you guys like sci fi epics with aliens and strong female leads (which you obviously do, because you read my Mass Effect fanfics), you should check it out! Same username on fictionpress. I'll finish chapter 20 before I start NaNo, so look for that around the 1st of November or a little later (once my beta has looked at it.)

After such a long absence, I'm glad to be back! Enjoy the new chapter :)

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><p><strong>Chapter 19: "Bring It On"<strong>

**Tara**

It was quiet aboard the _Normandy_ this late. Captain Shepard and Councilor Vakarian were still out at their state dinner, Doctor T'Soni was holed up in her office, EDI and Joker were cuddled up in the cockpit, and it seemed that everyone else had gone to bed early, exhausted by the long Palaven day.

And she was restless as usual. So she went to the rec room for a cocktail and maybe a game of solitaire.

As she entered the room, she discovered that someone else had the same idea. She recognized her right away – the slight young woman with brown hair. Traynor, she'd called herself. Her feet were curled up under her and she cradled a drink in her delicate hands. She smiled as Tara recovered from the sudden discovery that she was not alone.

"Can't sleep?" Traynor asked.

"Nah," Tara replied as she poured herself a scotch. "I don't sleep much, specially after a day as quiet as today."

"I hear you walked the entire length of Cipritine City for the second day in a row," Traynor said, her brown eyes twinkling. "That sounds pretty packed to me."

Tara let out a short laugh, "I guess that does sound busy."

She put a few ice cubes in her class and headed over to join Traynor on the couch.

"I guess I just like a lot of stimulation," she concluded. "I don't sit still well."

"You sound like Shepard," Traynor said, "always has a list a lightyear long of things to do and gets anxious when it actually drops to a reasonable number."

"Wow, high praise for the new girl," Tara said.

She was surprised at how hard that compliment landed – it was as if suddenly she had a lot to live up to. And Traynor looked down quickly at her response, her cheeks flushing.

"I just – erm – I just meant you and Shepard – I suppose it's a marine thing. I don't quite have the energy for your job."

"Takes a certain kind?" Tara prompted.

"Exactly," Traynor's relieved smile flashed white across her tan face. "A certain kind."

Silence washed over the room, then, and Tara felt the need to break it, to keep the conversation going.

"It's Specialist Traynor, right?"

"Oh please," the young woman waved her hand as if the mere idea of formality were silly. "Samantha."

"Samantha. I'm Tara. So what are you doing up so late?" she asked.

"Oh, just unwinding. I like the quiet in here when everyone's gone to sleep. It's soothing."

"Am I disturbing you?"

"Oh, goodness, no! Of course not," she said, putting her drink down and leaning in earnestly. "It's not that I don't enjoy company. I just like quiet as well. And your company is quite pleasant. I mean, I'm not… No, of course you're not disturbing me. You're welcome."

Tara felt a smile creep across her face, and she settled into the couch.

"Well, good. I'll stick around then."

"Good. I'm glad. How do you like the _Normandy?_"

Tara shrugged.

"I'm liking it. Except for the sitting around and waiting. I want to be out there doing something, part of the action."

Samantha smiled, shrugging in return.

"Sitting around and waiting is about all I do around here. I'm certainly not a soldier. But then, I'm used to sitting and waiting. With lab work you don't do much else."

"You're a scientist?" Tara asked.

"Yes," Samantha replied. "I went to university back on Earth. Oxford. I'm not one for combat. The noise, the mess, the danger," she shuddered. "Not my thing."

She shook her head, seemingly in awe of that type of person for whom that _was_ their "thing."

"I don't know how you all do it, quite frankly. I'm beyond grateful. If it weren't for people like you and Shepard, we wouldn't even be here today. But I don't understand it."

Tara took another sip of her drink.

"It is pretty different from lab work," she admitted. "I like the action, but I do miss the brain challenge sometimes. You work different muscles on the battlefield than on the chess board."

Samantha perked up suddenly, her brown eyes widening with true joy at this discovery:

"Wait, you're a scientist as well? _And _a soldier? And you play chess?"

"I studied xenobiology before I joined up with the Alliance. I was actually finishing up my doctoral research on Eden Prime when Saren attacked. It was the reaper threat that made me join up. This was just too big to ignore," she paused, then grinned a little.

"Well, color me impressed," Samantha said, crossing her arms. "Would you be up for a game? I brought a chess set aboard – it's in here. We could go a round or two, see who's the real brainiac aboard."

Tara grinned. She liked a good challenge.

"Bring it on."

"You might not be so confident when you hear that I wiped the floor with Shepard, but if you want to challenge the reigning champion…" she trailed off.

Tara made a not-impressed sound.

"Shepard's a marine, born and bred. The girl's got a quad, but chess is another story."

"I guess we'll see about that," Traynor winked and then hopped up from her seat to retrieve a small GUI interface chess set from the pile of cards and other board games in the rec room.

She returned to the table, setting up the board as Tara poured them both another drink. She met Samantha's eyes and saw delight sparking in the warm brown tones.

"As you said, 'bring it on.'"

Tara raised her glass: "I'll drink to that."

**Shepard**

It was late when they had finished their brief with Cipritine Police and the Council Security team, but the moment they were back aboard the _Normandy,_ Shepard and Garrus headed down to level two and knocked on Liara's door.

"I got your message," she said as soon as Liara's face appeared, the asari's blue eyes concerned.

"Shepard, are you alright?" she asked immediately.

"Yeah, I'm fine."

Garrus chimed in as he slipped in the door behind her: "This one brings trouble wherever she goes."

"You always seem to be with me," she retorted.

He shrugged nonchalantly.

Liara arched a slender eyebrow, an amused smile playing at her mouth: "Your old friends aren't wasting any time, are they?"

She took a seat at one of the consoles and pulled up some correspondence.

"No chatter about the attack turned up on my networks until after the fact, but I did find something earlier today that I wanted to talk to you about. I got word from one of my agents. Balak showed up recently on a space station in the Terminus Systems called Saarnash, and he's not happy, from what my source had to tell me."

"Balak?" Shepard asked, leaning over Liara's shoulder to read the message. "What's he doing on some small-time station? I would have thought he'd be busy on Khar'shan trying to put the pieces back together."

Garrus gave a short, humorless laugh: "Figures he'd be the supreme leader of the batarians. Perfect fit."

"Well, that's the thing," Liara said, craning her neck to look at Garrus and Shepard as she explained, "It seems he found himself uninvited to the batarian party once the reapers were gone."

Shepard stood, crossing her arms over her chest.

"Well, that's interesting," she remarked. "Any idea what could make the batarians so angry with him to stage a coup? It's not like they're not used to brutal dictators. That's kinda status quo over there."

"It appears to have been his involvement with you, Shepard," Liara explained.

"Involvement?"

"Lending the batarian army to fight the reapers," Garrus surmised. "I guess they didn't like him getting into bed with the batarians' mortal enemy."

Shepard cringed at that: "Okay, can we please use a different analogy to describe this?"

Liara chuckled at that: "Sorry, Shepard. But Garrus is right – the batarians saw Balak as a traitor for working with you. They thought he should have killed you on sight rather than offer you aid. They were pretty upset, to say the least."

"So he fled to Saarnash. How's that working out for him?"

"Well, until recently, it was ideal. But word has leaked out to Cerberus, so my guess is it's just a matter of time before he tries to disappear again."

Shepard grinned.

"Can I assume the 'until recently' involves you?"

"I might have sent a tip their way," Liara said, that enigmatic smile spreading. "I don't think Cerberus is doing anything about it for now, but they've got him on their radar. With Saarnash that close to Omega, they're concerned about him gathering a following. He doesn't seem to be involved in anything suspicious for now – he's just trying to stay out of the way, keep the new leader of the Hegemony from coming after him."

"He wants to show he's not a threat," Garrus said.

"Exactly."

"So can we assume that he's not working with the Hegemony?" Shepard asked.

"My source seems to think his story is legit. I've tasked him to keep an eye on Balak to confirm it, but it certainly seems that he's been cast out."

"Hmm." Shepard paced the back corner of Liara's office, a plan forming somewhere in the back of her mind. She just had to coax out the details.

"What is it?" Garrus asked.

"Balak is not going to just accept exile. He'll find a way back in, or eventually he'll find a way to make trouble."

"That's what Miranda thinks," Liara confirmed with a nod.

"What are you thinking?" Garrus fixed his cool gaze on her as she paced.

She sighed: "I don't like it, but we could work with him. He wants back in. Let's use that."

"Strike a deal with him?" Garrus asked.

She stopped her pacing, crossing her arms again. "We'll have to be careful. I don't actually want to interfere in batarian politics. Say what you want about them, I'm not going to be a kingmaker. But Balak has nothing right now. Maybe he'd be willing to make a deal."

"The enemy of my enemy…"

"Exactly."

**Tara**

"Check."

"Fuck!"

Samantha grinned at the outburst. Tara scrutinized the board. It had been quite the back and forth, and after hours of play only a few pieces remained. The game had been a dance of wits – each had cornered the other multiple times, only to find the other seem to magic herself out of the situation. Their drinks sat forgotten, condensation cooling into rings around the glasses.

"Just admit defeat, Tara," Samantha said through her mischievous grin. "You know it's over. Just admit it."

The facts stared up at her, plain as the checkered board. She had lost – she knew it.

"Christ," she exclaimed, making one of the few moves available to her – all her options led to the same conclusion:

"Checkmate!" Samantha's exclamation was giddy, gleeful. She grinned up at Tara, white teeth and brown skin.

A sudden noise in the hallway outside – the captain and Vakarian must be back now – drew her attention to the door. When she looked back, Samantha was gathering up the chess board.

"I should go," she explained. "It's late."

Tara nodded, the suddenness of the evening slowing her, hanging like a fog between her ears.

As Samantha headed for the door, Tara stood abruptly, catching her before she could leave with a gentle hand on her shoulder.

"Can I get a rematch sometime?" she asked, her voice quieter than she intended.

"You bet," Samantha grinned.

And then she was gone, vanished into the darkness of the ship.


	20. Former Enemies, Former Allies

Sorry for yet another long break! Now that NaNoWriMo and exams are both over, I have more free time. The plan is to settle in to a 2-3 week publishing schedule. This story has quite a few more chapters in it, and I'm ready to start picking up the pace! Yay!

If you want to read my NaNoWriMo novel (warning: first, very rough draft) you can find it on my fictionpress page (same pen name as here).

* * *

><p><strong>Chapter 20: "Former Enemies, Former Allies"<strong>

**Shepard**

When they docked on the Citadel the next afternoon, Shepard returned to the apartment she and Garrus shared only to pack a few extra military-issue uniforms and grab a quick, non-military-issue meal before she departed again.

She could tell Garrus was itching to come with her. They were a team, he loved a good fight, and she knew he wanted to be there with her, watching her back.

"Garrus," she'd nearly laughed when he suggested he continue on with her to Saarnash, "You're a councilor. You're a galactic security issue – the Hierarchy isn't going to let you take off on an adventure."

"This is even worse than C-Sec," he muttered.

That time, she did laugh, and when she did, he softened. He even chuckled a little, too.

"Okay, so it's not worse than C-Sec," he admitted. "But it's frustrating."

"I know," she said, turning to pack the last of her things in a small rolling bag.

Garrus sat on the bed, watching her close the case. The computerized lock beeped as it shut, its tiny display blinking off.

The sounds of the Citadel outside were quiet and muffled through thick, bullet-proof glass, but there was a strange normalcy to it. It was subtle, unobtrusive, and a reminder, just as the gentle vibrations of the _Normandy's_ engines had been a reminder for so long, of where they were.

But no matter how long they stayed here, Shepard wasn't sure these new, quiet sounds would ever feel like home.

"Would it be terrible for me to say that a small part of me misses the war?" Garrus said, suddenly, blankly.

Shepard turned away from the window and met his eyes.

"Not the reapers," he added, "but the cause… We had something to fight for. We couldn't afford to rest, and now…"

"We're restless," she concluded.

His expression was unreadable, but she didn't need to see his inner turmoil on his face to know how he felt.

She took a seat beside him, her hand settling softly on his, their breathing blending smoothly into the quiet background of Citadel noise.

**Tali**

She was amazed at the condition of the Citadel. Perhaps she shouldn't have been, considering the Keepers' reputation and she work she saw them do after the Battle of the Citadel, but it still awed her to step off the _Barunaal _into gleaming, smooth lines, not marred by rubble or even dust. It hadn't been that long since the Reapers had taken the Citadel. She had not seen the damage herself, but she knew it must have been awful.

And yet, here she was, stepping onto the Citadel again, and feeling every bit as small as she had on her first visit here during her Pilgrimage. She stood still a moment, letting the experience settle in.

She saw everything with new eyes, these days. Sometimes, it felt like a dream.

And then Gerrel and Xen emerged from the ship behind her, all piercing voices and disruptive pomposity, and the dream vanished. She sighed.

Raan, who had swiftly veered away from Gerrel and Xen, rested a hand on Tali's shoulder.

"It has been many years since I have seen the Citadel," she said. "Since my Pilgrimage as a young girl."

"Has it changed?" Tali asked, knowing the question was silly, but wanting the answer anyway.

"Not a bit," Raan replied, and Tali could hear the smile in her voice, despite her dark helmet. "Come," her aunt continued, "let's check into the hotel before Gerrel and Xen take the best rooms."

Tali grinned at that, and squeezed her aunt's hand. The geth representatives would be arriving later, just before the meeting. Unlike organics, they had no need for rest and recuperation after a long flight. Though from what she had witnessed of them since Legion's update, they did seem to be developing an appreciation for the aesthetic that she had previously assumed to be exclusively organic, so perhaps their behavior would change more than she expected.

Hours later, their belongings in the block of rooms that had been reserved for them, Tali, Raan, and Koris met in Raan's hotel room to prepare for their meeting the next morning with the council.

"What we need," Koris said, his voice calm and thoughtful, "is simply footing in the Citadel. We need a chance to prove ourselves."

"Gerrel and Xen will argue that we already have, with the aid we gave to Commander Shepard in the fight against the Reapers," Raan replied.

Koris waved away the remark: "They will argue, but we already know that is not enough to sway the council. Especially considering the situation with the geth."

"You mean the standoff that nearly killed an entire race?" Tali heard the sarcasm dripping from her own voice, but she did not intend to censor herself here, with these two allies. She would save that self-control for later.

Raan nodded solemnly, the bright light of the Citadel's artificial afternoon reflecting off her helmet.

"They are concerned, and rightly so, that we are hot-tempered, irrational, quick to anger," she said. "It is the same argument that we have heard for hundreds of years. We act without thinking – it is what brought the geth into existence."

"What about the geth?" Koris said thoughtfully.

Tali and her aunt both turned their heads to regard him, though his demeanor revealed nothing about his thoughts.

"What _about_ them?" Tali finally asked.

"Perhaps working together, we can help each other. Showing a strong relationship with the geth might help the council to see that most of us are rational."

"Who did the geth send to represent them?" Raan asked.

"He calls himself Senator," Tali said. "He was one of the geth on Rannoch when they received their… upload."

"Senator?" Raan echoed, amusement in her tone.

Tali shrugged. 'They're not very good at the naming thing yet."

"I imagine it must be unusual to spring fully formed from a consensus…" Koris said. "How do you choose a name for yourself or make a life for yourself when all you have ever known is unity?"

The question was rhetorical, and neither woman tried to answer it. It hung in the air between them.

"Tali," Raan said, breaking the silence, "Will you reach out to Senator? See if he will meet with us when they dock at the Citadel."

Tali was already typing away on her omni-tool, drafting a quick message to the geth representative.

"If we are going to make a place for ourselves in this galaxy, we are not going to be able to do it alone," Raan concluded.

Tali agreed. If there was one thing she had learned in the past three years, it was that there was no place for self-isolation in this galaxy. All you had to do was look to the batarians to see the dangers of xenophobia. And all you had to do was remember the Battle for Earth to understand what the disparate races could do when they joined forces.

**Shepard**

They set a course for Saarnash, and Shepard and Liara put their heads together to devise a strategy for dealing with Balak.

"My source says he's getting anxious," Liara updated Shepard right away. "He's been in one place too long and he thinks he's being followed."

"Is he?"

Liara smiled wryly: "Balak has more enemies than just Cerberus and you. I have no doubt he's being followed."

"By the Hegemony?"

Liara nodded. She brought up a file on her console.

"Information from within the Hegemony is difficult to come by," she said, "but I finally found someone on the inside willing to talk, for a price."

She was sitting straighter, her fingers flying over the keypad as she called up the various messages and data files she had obtained. Shepard smiled at the confidence once again radiating from her friend.

"Here," Liara said, tilting the screen for Shepard to see. "This is the new leader of the Hegemony."

Her eyes scanned the screen, and immediately froze on the name at the top of the page. _Charn_.

She looked back at Liara, whose expression was almost gleeful.

"You're kidding me," Shepard said dryly.

"I wanted to see your face when you learned this," Liara said. "But no, I'm not joking. Charn is the one who ousted Balak, according to my inside source."

"This is rich," Shepard said, crossing her arms and leaning back.

She tried to suppress her own gleeful response to this news, but it was hard not to feel there was some poetic justice to this. Balak was slimy and untrustworthy, and she had no trouble believing that he had gotten exactly what he deserved when he was forced into exile. She didn't believe that all batarians were as bad as the Hegemony, but if there ever were an example of power corrupting… well, that was it.

And now, Balak's one-time second-in-command was his number-one enemy. It was almost too good to be true.

But she wasn't in this to exact some sort of revenge on Balak. He _had_ offered her assistance against the reapers, after all, as much as it had felt like his last resort. And she was still wary of playing with batarian politics. If she had it her way, she would simply offer Balak sanctuary. But she wasn't sure he would be content with that.

Strike that. She _knew_ he wouldn't be content with that. She sighed.

Liara raised an eyebrow.

"What is it, Shepard?" she asked.

"I just don't know what we're going to do once we find Balak," she confessed. "I'm not willing to make this into an international issue."

"They attacked _you_. They've already made it an international issue."

"It's still a personal grudge on their end, as far as I can tell. And it goes against everything I've fought for to meddle, as much as I'd _like_ to tell the batarians what to do." She sighed again. "Actually, what I'd really like to tell them is where they can stick it."

"Unfortunately, I have a feeling that won't stop them from attempting to assassinate you," Liara said calmly.

"I know," Shepard admitted. "I just don't like my options."

"Well, we'll have to create some more options, then."

"Now you're onto something," Shepard smiled.


End file.
